
Class L_ 



Book. ■ Jjz^ 



A SliETCH 






THE HISTORY 



PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 



JAMAICA, L. I. 



BY 



JAMES M. MACDONALD, 

MINISTER OF SAID CHURCH, 



Upon this rock I will build my church ; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it/ 

, , . Matt. xvi. 18. 



NEW-YORK: 

LEAVITT, TROW & CO., PRINTERS. 

1847. 



-^5" 05 3 
*03 









» 



TO 

AMOS DENTON, 
SENIOR ELDER 

OF THE 

CHURCH WHOSE HISTORY IS HERE SKETCHED, 

AND WHO, 

FOR NEAKLY THIRTY YEARS, HAS BEEN AN UNIVERSALLY RESPECTED 
MEMBER OF ITS SESSION, 

THIS VOLUME 

IS INSCRIBED, 
AS A SLIGHT TESTIMONIAL OF ESTEEM, 

BY HIS OBLIGED FRIEND, ^ 

THE COMPILER. 



PREFACE. 



In the following pages the compiler has 
aimed at the greatest accuracy. He has also 
studied to be as brief as any thing like a satisfac- 
tory view of events, extending through more than 
one hundred and eighty years, would allow. 

He acknowledges himself indebted to the 
sketches left by Mr. Faitoute and Mr. Crane, 
and to manuscripts amounting to more than one 
hundred pages, relating principally to the early 
history of this church, kindly put into his hands 
by an antiquarian friend. 

He has been much assisted by the full and 
impartial outline of ecclesiastical affairs, in 
Thompson'sL History of Long Island, a book for 
which the author deserves well of the citizens of 
his native island. But his special acknowledg- 
ments are due to Henry Onderdonk, Jr., Princi- 
pal of Union Hall Academy, and author of Revo- 
lutionary Incidents, who, in his extensive re- 



PREFACE. 



searches, has taken the trouble to note whatever 
might throw light on the history of this church, 
for the use of the compiler, or has directed him 
to sources of valuable information. 

Parsonage-House, ) 
Jamaica, Sept. 20, 1847. \ 



INTRODUCTION. 



The first inhabitants came to Jamaica, dm'ing the 
administration of Peter Stuyvesant. The Enghsh, 
however, laying claim to the same territory, it was 
smTendered to them, by the Dutch, in the year of our 
Lord 1664. 

After the Revolution in England, in 1688, a great 
change took place in the Colonial government. A 
General Assembly was allowed, which consisted of 
deputies, chosen by the freeholders of each County, to 
whom, together with the Governor and the Council, 
the legislative power was intrusted. 

In 1692, Col. Fletcher arrived, with a commission 
to be Governor of the Colony. He very soon mani- 
fested great zeal to form a " religious establishment ;" 
and, whilst the government was in his hands, a new 
policjr was adopted, in respect to ecclesiastical affairs, 
which, at length, produced much dissension, and 
operated with disastrous effect on the Presbyterian 
churches, in Hempstead and Jamaica. The recom- 
mendation of the Governor was for " the settling of an 
able ministry," but no intimation was given that the 
Episcopal denomination was to be exclusively sup- 
ported by law. The majority of the Assembly were 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

entirely disinclined to the scheme ; but, as the model 
of the Church of Holland had been secured to them by 
one of the articles of surrender, it is not probable that 
they suspected Fletcher of his design to introduce uni- 
formity of religion, or to have the Episcopal denomi- 
nation exclusively supported by law. The Governor 
warmly rebuked them, asserting that the same law 
which secured to them the privileges of Englishmen 
did " provide for the religion of the Church of Eng- 
land." Fletcher was a bigot to the Episcopal form of 
church government.* 

In Sept. 1G93, a new Assembly met. The deter- 
mination of the Governor at length induced the house 
to yield; and a bill was "brought in for settling the 
ministry, and raising a maintenance for them in the 
City and County of New- York, Counties of Richmond 
and Westchester and Queen's County." The bill was 
drawn by James Grahame, Esq., the Speaker of the 
Assembly, who was the only member of that body 
who belonged to the Church of England. As the in- 
habitants of Jamaica were, at that time, engaged in 
erecting a new house of worship, and had applied to 
the Assembly for an Act to enable them to raise money 
for completing the work. Col. Fletcher and Grahame, 
perceiving the Assembly inclined to pass such an Act, 
thought it a favorable opportunity, to press their fa- 
vorite measure for a religious establishment, and ac- 
cordingly brought in the bill aforesaid. It was art- 
fully framed, and prescribed a method of induction that 
" would not do well for the Dissenters, and but lamely 
for the Church, tho' 'twould do with the help of the 

* Smith, I. p. 128. 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

Governor."* The bill passed and was sent to the 
Governor and Council, who immediately returned it, 
with an amendment to the effect that ministers should 
be " presented to the Governor to be approved and col- 
lated." The members of the house refused to pass the 
amendment. Fletcher was so highly exasperated, that 
he summoned the representatives forthwith to the 
council chamber, and told them that he had " the 
power of collating or suspending any minister in his 
government." Smith thinks that it can only be attri- 
buted to the simplicity of the times that the members 
of the Assembly peaceably put up with that man's 
rudeness. The charter of privileges granted by the 
Duke of York to the inhabitants of New- York pro- 
vided that all " persons which profess in Godlynesse 
Jesus Christ" might "from time to time, and at all 
times, have and fully enjoy their judgments and con- 
sciences in matters of religion throughout all the pro- 
vince." The same charter confirmed "the respective 
Christian churches now in practice within the Citty of 
New-Yorke, Long Island, and the other places of this 
province," " that they shall be held and reputed as 

PRIVELDGED ChURCIIES, AND ENJOY THEIR FORMER FREE- 
DOMS OF THEIR RELIGION, IN DIVINE WORSHIP AND CHURCH 
DISCIPLINE." 

In the spring of 1695, the Assembly declared, in 
explanation of the Act of 1G93, " That the vestry-men 
and church wardens have power to call a dissenting 
Protestant minister, and that he is to be paid and main- 
tained as the Act directs." This was done on account 
of the attempt to interpret the Act as made for the 

* Col. Lewis Morris' MS. Letter to the Ven. See. 
1* 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

sole benefit of the Episcopal denomination. The de- 
sign of the Governor, and the secret of all his zeal, for 
" settling the ministry," was now made evident ; for 
he rejected the interpretation of the Assembly, and de- 
cided that the act applied solely to the Episcopal min- 
istry. 

Lord Cornbury was appointed to succeed the Earl 
of Bellomont in the government, and he arrived in the 
Colony, early in the year 1702. In his zeal for Epis- 
copacy he was not behind any of his predecessors, and 
therefore he was a fit instrument to carry out the 
policy of Gov. Fletcher. " His persecution of the 
Presbyterians very early increased the number of his 
enemies ; the Dutch too were fearful of his religious 
rage against them, as he disputed their right to call 
and settle ministers, or even schoolmasters, without 
his special hcense." "We never had a Governor so 
universally detested, nor any who so richly deserved 
the public abhorrence. In spite of his noble descent, 
his behavior was trifling, mean, and extravagant. It 
was not uncommon for him to dress himself in a wo- 
man's habit, and then to patrol the fort in which he 
resided. Such freaks of low humor exposed him to 
the universal contempt of the people ; but their indig- 
nation was kindled by his despotic rule, savage bigotry, 
insatiable avarice, and injustice, not only to the public, 
but even his private creditors ; for he left some of the 
lowest tradesmen, in his employment, unsatisfied in 
their just demands."* 

Such was the man whom the Presbyterians of Ja- 
maica long had cause to remember. To honor his 
* Smith, I. pp. 190, 194. 



INTRODUCTION. 11 

memory,* must be to disregard the most authentic tes- 
timony as to his true character. " Cornbury became 
so obnoxious to the inhabitants of this province that 
they sent a complaint to England against him. The 
queen in consequence of this complaint displaced 
him."f " Lord Cornbury did more to bring disgrace 
upon the administration of the Colony, than all his 
predecessors together. There was never probably a 
Governor of New- York so universally detested, and 
who so richy deserved it."J Grahame says, "in every 
quarter of the province the Governor offered his assist- 
ance to the Episcopalians, to put them in possession of 
the ecclesiastical edifices that other sects had built ; 
and to the disgrace of some of the zealots of Episco- 
pacy, this offer was in various instances accepted, and 
produced the most disgusting scenes of riot, injustice, 
and confusion." 

* See a Discourse by Rev. W. M. Carmichael, delivered at Hemp- 
stead, 1841. 

t Notes on Brooklyn, by Hon. G. Furman, p. 108. 
t Thompson, 11. 108. 



12 EARLY RECORDS. 



CHAPTER I. 

1656—1700. 

Settlement of Jamaica. — Daniel Denton. — Extracts from the early Re- 
cords. — Measures taken for the regular preaching of the Gospel. — 
Zechariah Walker engaged. — First house of worship erected. — Mr. 
W.'s departure. — John Prudden called. — Church organized. — Was it 
Presbyterian 1 — Mr. P. leaves. — Wm. Woodruff. — Mr. Prudden re- 
turns. — Removes to Newark. — His death and character. — The old 
stone meeting-house built. — Jeremiah Hobart called. — George Phillips. 
— J. Hobart becomes minister. — Mr. Hobart's testimony to the value 
of the Bible. 

The first entry in the records of Jamaica is dated 
the 18th of February, 1656 ; but it is probable that tlie 
settlement of the town was commenced the year be- 
fore. The first inhabitants, there is abundant evidence 
to prove, were men of character and piety. They had 
fled from tyranny and oppression in the old world, and 
were ardently devoted to the cause of civil liberty, and 
zealous for the purity and simplicity of the Protestant 
religion. In the reign of Charles II., both civil and 
religious liberty had been overthrown " by the illegal 
and tyrannical extension of the royal prerogative, and 
by the intolerance of the established church." The 
first settlers belonged to that noble race of men — those 
fearless advocates of civil and religious liberty — from 



EARLY RECORDS. 13 

whom it should be regarded as a great honor to have 
descended, I mean the Enghsh Non-conformists. 

A few of them came to this place from Hempstead, 
which had been settled ten or twelve years before ; the 
remainder of the original seventeen probably came 
directly from New England. The Dentons, the Ever- 
itts, the Mills's, the Rhoades's, and the Smiths, among 
the original proprietors — the Skidmores, the Creeds, 
the Higbies, the Carpenters, the Baylies and the Lam- 
bersons, all mentioned as among the earlier inhabi- 
tants, are still represented here by numerous descend- 
ants, who, for the most part, belong to the Presbyterian 
congregation, and constitute no inconsiderable portion 
of it. Daniel Denton, the first town clerk, was a son 
of the Rev. Richard Denton, minister of Hempstead. 
He wrote " A Brief Description of New- York, formerly 
called New Amsterdam," which was published in Lon- 
don in 1670. A copy of the work is in the Library of 
Columbia College ; it has also, within a few years, been 
republished by the Philadelphia Historical Society. Mr. 
Denton, in company with Luke Watson, and John 
Baylie, purchased of the Indians the tract of land on 
which Elizabethtown, N. J., was built. Watson and 
Baylie, who had been influential characters in this town, 
are mentioned, together with two others, as the persons 
to whom Gov. NicoU granted a patent for this tract. 
Elizabethtown was settled in 1664, and Luke Watson 
and John Baylie were among the first settlers of that 
respectable place. 

The name given to this town by the original set- 
tlers was Jemaica, no doubt derived from Yemacah,* 
* Town Records. 



14 EARLY RECORDS. 

the name of a branch, or a few famihes, of the Rockewa 
tribe of Indians, who resided along the small stream, 
running from Beaver Pond, and at the head of the 
bay. The Dutch government conferred on the settle- 
ment the name of Rusdorp, which occurs more fre- 
quently in the early records, and was probably used 
exclusively in conveyances of property. After the 
surrender of the colony to the English, Jamaica soon 
came to be exclusively used. 

The following are extracts from the first volume of 
the Records of the town, which was carefully trans- 
cribed by James Martin, Esq., in 1797. The original 
is in a tolerable state of preservation. 

Feb. 27th, 1658. It is y^ day voted, ordered and 
agreed upon by this town of Rusdorp, that no person or 
persons whatsoever, within this town, shall sell or give 
directly or indirectly, to any Indian or Indians whatso- 
ever, within or about y'' said town, any strong licker or 
strong drinks whatsoever or of what sort soever, either 
much or little, more or less, upon the forfeiture of 
fifty Guilders [nearly twenty dollars] for every offence. 

Jan. 21st, 1659. One Benjamin Hubard, who had 
bought a house-lot, without the approbation or know- 
ledge of the town, was required to bind himself " to 
behave so in the town y' he no waies prejudice his 
neighbours, by any unlawful or bad courses ; and y*^ 
said Benjamin doth engage himself if he shall fullfill not 
all and every particular in y*^ premises, to surrender up 
his lot again to the town." 

March 13th, 1662. It is ordered and agreed by the 
town that John Baylie shall keep an Ordinary in the 
town of Rusdorp, for the entertaining of strangers, 
and also to sell drink, and that no man shall have lib- 
erty to sell drink, whether beer or liquors, or any sort 
of wine, within this town only the Ordinary keeper 



EARLY RECORDS. 15 

aforesaid, and that he shall forthwith set upon the 
work to provide for strangers, and to give entertain- 
ment to such strangers as shall come. 

The inhabitants early manifested a desire to have a 
minister of the Gospel among them. It is quite certain 
that public worship was regularly established as early 
at least as January, 1662. Under date of Jan. 30th 
of that year, we have this record : " The town do give 
Abraham Smith 30s. for beating the drum a year." In 
the minute of the following year, the object of beating 
the drum is stated. " Jan. 29, 1663. It is voted by 
the town, that Abraham Smith shall have 305. a year 
for beating the drum upon Sabbath days, and other 
public meeting days," &c. All the people, at that time, 
were of the same religious denomination, and so con- 
tinued for forty or fifty years ;* and all ecclesiastical 
business was conducted by the town, assembled in 
town meeting. A meeting of the town was a meeting 
of the congregation, which after having disposed of 
matters secular, could attend to the business of the 
church. Accordingly the early history of the Presby- 
terian congregation is to be derived mainly from the 
records of the town. All the early ministers were 
called by the town, or the magistrates in its behalf, 
and their maintenance was raised by the town. The 
same persons constituted the church and the town ; 
and the two boards of magistrates and elders, in places 
where these latter officers were found, were often the 
same individuals. f The first volume of minutes of the 
town of Jamaica are very brief, and somewhat imper- 

* Rev. G. J. Garretson's Disc, p. 10. 

t Rev. S. Woodbridge, Jr.'s, Hist. Dis., p. 8. 



16 EARLY RECORDS. 

feet, SO that the earliest history of the church is neces- 
sarily involved in considerable obscurity. It may be 
added that there are no records of the session of the 
church, prior to the year 17G2 ; although it can be 
proved that there w^as a regular session, if not from the 
beginning, yet long anterior to that date. 

March 6th, 1662. It was ordered by the town that 
the rates for the minister should be levied upon mead- 
ows ; and, at the same meeting, it was further ordered, 
"that the townsmen (the select-men or magistrates) shall 
look after the procuring of a minister ;" which proves 
that although there had probably been occasional 
preaching prior to this date, the place was not, as yet, 
statedly supplied. The " townsmen " who were 
charged with the aforesaid business, were John Baylie, 
Nathaniel Denton, and Thomas Foster. During this 
year the town proceeded to erect " a minister's house," 
which, from the " the articles of agreement " with the 
contractors, on record, must have been a substantial 
dwelling. There appears to have been such an entire 
unanimity in this movement, that " every man " in the 
town engaged to pay his proportion of the expense. 
They evidently set a high value on the gospel, not de- 
laying until some missionary, by foreign aid, should 
find his way among them, to labor single-handed, in 
the midst of the indifferent or opposers, but preparing 
the way for the ambassador of the cross, by furnishing 
the means of giving him a welcome reception. Can 
we wonder that God has so signally blessed an enter- 
prise which was begun in such a spirit ? May such 
men never want worthy successors, who, when the 
interests of religion demand it, shall be ready, " every 



MR. walker's ministry. 17 

man to pay and bring in what shall come to their 
shares " of any necessary expense ! 

Dec. 20th, 1662. The town appointed a committee 
of five men to " make the rate for the minister's house, 
and transporting the minister ;" from which it appears 
that a minister had now been engaged to settle at Ja- 
maica. And under date of Feb. 14th, 1663, seven 
years after the settlement of the town, appears, for the 
first time in the records, the name of the first minister 
of this place, 

ZECHARIAH WALKER. 

The minute is as follows : 

Feb. 14th, 1663. A town-meeting called. Voted 
and agreed upon by the town that goodman Benedic 
and Nathaniel Denton shall be overseers, in behalf of 
the town, to supply Mr. Walker's wants, what he shall 
stand in need of, according as the town shall agree to 
make a supply, and to appoint men as their turns come 
to bring in, what shall be needful in the premises, as need 
shall require. 

Voted by the town at what rate or price, Mr. 
Walker shall be paid in. Concluded that he shall have 
threescore pounds per annum, and that it shall be paid 
by rate, the rates to be levied upon lands and estates ; 
that is, to be paid in corn, the wheat to be paid at six 
shillings a bushel and Indian at three shillings sixpence 
a bushel. 

March 2d, 1663. "We whose names are under- 
written, do, by these presents, give unto Mr. Walker, 
his heirs or assigns, the house, and home-lot, that he 
lives in, with the accommodations belonging to it upon 
the premises ; that if he go away and leave the town 
without any just grounds or cause given by the town, 



18 MR. walker's ministry. 

that then the town shall have the refusal of it, paying 
for such labours as he hath or shall expend upon it, and 
it shall return again to the town ; but if the town shall 
act so that they shall be the cause of his going away, 
then the lot to remain as his and his heirs', only the 
town to have the refusal of it, to buy it for what it shall 
be worth ; and if it happen that the said Mr. Walker 
should die, then his wife shall let the town have the re- 
fusal of it, if she shall sell it." Then follow the names 
of twenty-four persons, including, it is probable, the 
whole number of freeholders in the town at that time. 

From the foregoing extracts it appears that Mr. 
Walker's salary was £60 per annum, with the use of a 
house, and a home-lot, to be his in fee-simple, if he re- 
mained as minister of the town, or if his leaving should 
be occasioned by the people. In raising this generous 
support, so much beyond what many infant churches, 
at the present day, especially in the new settlements, 
feel themselves able to do, every inhabitant contributed 
his due proportion. 

Mr. Walker was a young man about twenty-five 
years of age, and preached at Jamaica as a licentiate. 
Mr. Wood says he probably came from England, and 
Mr. Crane, in his MS. history of this church, adds that 
he probably came from England before he was ordain- 
ed, but as a licentiate. Mr. Thompson, however, as- 
serts that he was a native of Boston, and was the son 
of Robert Walker, who was made a freeman at that 
place in 1634. 

Aug. 30th, 1663. A town-meeting called. Voted 
and agreed upon by the town that a Meeting House 
shall be built twenty-six feet square, and that Mr. Coe 
and Ralph Keeler shall agree with George Norton for 
the building of it. 



MR. walker's ministry. 19 

This house was probably finished soon after, but, as 
the town erected another before the close of the centu- 
ry, we may presume that it was a cheap structure. Of 
its site, tradition has not, to my knowledge, left any 
trace. 

In Dec, 1663, it was agreed that the inhabitants 
"shall pay towards the maintenance of the minister, 
according to what they possess." In Feb., 1664, ano- 
ther committee was appointed to " gather up and look 
after to supply Mr. Walker such things as he shall 
stand in need of" In Sept., 1665, the salary before 
mentioned was continued to Mr. Walker, and the town 
further stipulated to cut and cart all his wood, to " till 
his grounds, and harvest his corn," and that Mr. W. 
should have his wheat at five shillings, instead of six, 
per bushel. It is gratifying to notice this liberal treat- 
ment of their minister, on the part of the first settlers of 
this town, and to be able to bear testimony — as I may 
properly do in this place — that the present congregation 
maintain the character of their ancestors in this respect. 

In March, 1666, the town agreed to add five pounds 
to Mr. Walker's salary, provided he should obtain ordi- 
nation, and thus not only " capacitate himself for the 
preaching of the word, but for the baptizing of infants." 
This proposal, as it shows a solicitude to enjoy the 
ordinances of the gospel, and particularly recognizes 
the duty of dedicating their offspring to God in baptism, 
speaks volumes in favor of the piety of the first inhabi- 
tants. He did not, it would seem, obtain ordination 
agreeable to the wishes of the town, for he took his 
departure from Jamaica shortly after, in consequence, 
as is evident, of the strong desire of the people to have 



20 MR. WALKER S MINISTRY. 

an ordained minister. On the 7th of Aug., 1668, the 
town appointed a committee to make a final settlement 
with him. This committee was directed to pay him for 
the improvements he had made on the parsonage and 
glebe, from which it is evident, according to the terms 
of the agreement made March 2d, 1663, that his de- 
parture was not from any occasion given by the people. 

He went to Stratford, Conn., where he received 
ordination, but removed to Woodbury * in 1678, of 
which place he was the first minister, and where he 
died, Jan., 1699, aged sixty-two. Robert Walker, who 
was a Judge of the Superior Court of Connecticut, is 
said by Thompson to have been his son, and Gen. Jo- 
seph Walker, an officer of the Revolution, his grandson. 

It is quite certain that there was no church regu- 
larly constituted during Mr. Walker's residence in Ja- 
maica, as inferred from a minute in the records — which 
will be noticed in the proper place — under the ministry 
of his successor. 

* " The following tradition is preserved respecting the occasion of Mr. 
Walker's coming to Woodbury. At the period of the first settlement of 
Woodbury, there were two candidates in Stratford, Mr. Walker and Mr. 
Reed. As there was some controversy who should leave, and go with 
the Woodbury settlers, they were requested to deliver a discourse on the 
day when it was to be decided — Mr. Walker in the forenoon and Mr. 
Reed in the afternoon. Mr. Walker took for his text, ' What went ye 
out into the wilderness for to see ? a reed shaken with the wind ?' He 
enlarged upon the circumstances and propriety of a reed being found in 
the wilderness, &c. Mr. Reed, in the afternoon, took for his te.xt, 
' Your adversary, the devil, walketh about,' &c. In the course of his 
observations, he stated that the great adversary of men was a great 
walker, and, instead of remaining with the brethren, ought to be kept 
walking at a distance." — Connecticut Hist. Coll., by J. W. Barber, p. 
504, note. 



MR. prudden's ministry. 21 



JOHN PRUDDEN. 



Nearly two years passed away before the town suc- 
ceeded in obtaining this minister, during which the Rev. 
EHphalet Jones, then of Greenwich, Conn., but who 
settled in Huntington in 1676, was invited to visit the 
town ; but it does not appear that he complied with the 
request. Mr. Prudden was called March 6th, 1670. 
He was a son of the Rev. Peter Prudden, who came to 
New Haven in company with the celebrated John Da- 
venport, and had charge of the church in Wethersfield, 
Conn., in 1638. John was born at Milford, Conn., 
Nov. 9th, 1645, to which place his father had removed, 
with a few of his congregation, in 1640, and begun the 
settlement of that town.* He graduated at Harvard 
Collegef in 1668, and was twenty-five years of age when 
he came to Jamaica. 

At the same town-meeting at which Mr. Prudden 
was called, it was ordered " that a convenient pew 
should be made for the minister to preach in," from 
which it may be inferred that the house of worship, 
built in 1663, was but a rude edifice. 

May 24th, 1672, it appears from the records that 
Mr. Prudden desired the town to allow him to build a 
house on the minister's lot, so called. The town accord- 
ingly appointed a committee to make an agreement 
with him. Three days after, on the 27th of May, this 
committee, on behalf of the town, entered into a written 
agreement with Mr. Prudden, to this effect : that his 
salary, £40 per annum, was to continue as before ; that 

* Hinman's Cat. of Puritan Names of Conn., p. 66. t Trien. Cat. 



22 MR. prudden's ministry. 

he might proceed to build on the minister's lot ; that if 
he should leave them through their default, they would 
reimburse him for the expenses incurred ; or in case 
the town should not see fit to pay for the house, then he 
should have liberty to remove it from their lot. " And 
for the confirmation of this agreement (I quote from 
the copy on record) the town did voluntarily engage 
themselves, at a town-meeting, held the third of June, 
that they would not obstruct or hinder, hut rather fur- 
ther the coming into a church way, according to the 
rules of the Gospel in this town, hy Mr. Prudden, and 
such as will join with him." The " coming into a 
church way, according to the rules of the Gospel," is 
language that cannot be mistaken ; it must refer to the 
organization of a church. It proves that up to the 3d 
of June, 1672, there had been no regularly constituted 
church of Christ in this place. The town had now 
been settled sixteen years, and it was ten years since 
Mr. Walker began his labors. But the inhabitants, it 
should be remembered, were few and isolated, and every 
thing was in an unorganized state at the time of Mr. 
Walker's arrival. Mr. W., moreover, was unordained, 
which fact, as the people earnestly desired to have the 
sacraments administered, finally led to his removal. 
Nearly two years more expired before the town suc- 
ceeded in getting a successor. The language, there- 
fore, that " they would not obstruct or hinder, but rather 
further the coming into a church way," may be under- 
stood not merely as expressing a respectful response to 
a proposition of Mr. Prudden on this subject, but as a 
cordial assent to it. It should also be remembered that 
those persons, among the first settlers of this tpwn, who 



MR. prudden's ministry. 23 

came from Hempstead, might have been members of 
the church in that place, and that no doubt they re- 
tained their membership in it, enjoying the privilege of 
statedly communing with their brethren, and of occa- 
sional visits from Mr. Denton, their pastor. It is also 
natural to suppose that other settlers, who came from 
New England, and other parts, would connect them- 
selves with the church at Hempstead, or at least seek 
the privilege of occasional communion. 

The question now arises, whether a church was or- 
ganized at, or soon after, the above-mentioned date. 
This question, I think, is sufficiently answered in the 
affirmative, from the fact that the vote to further the 
organization of a church, was passed at a town meet- 
ing, convened to confirm the agreement which their 
committee had previously entered into with Mr. Prud- 
den ; and that he remained, in accordance with the 
conditions he had entered into with the town. 

Our next inquiry relates to the kind of church 
which was formed. In the early records I cannot find 
that the word Congregational, or Independent, or Pres- 
byterian, is ever used in a single instance. It has 
sometimes been inferred that because the major part of 
the people were supposed to have come from New 
England, it must have been a Congregational church. 
But this would not follow, even admitting that all the 
inhabitants came directly from New England. The 
Puritans were not all Congregational ists. This was a 
term applied to Independents, Presbyterians, and even 
to Episcopalians — to all who desired a greater degree 
of purity in doctrines, discipline, and ceremonies, than 
characterized the Church of England. Nor were the 



24 MR. trudden's ministry. 

Puritans of New England all Congregationalists. The 
truth is, " that as the great majority of Puritans in 
England were Presbyterian, so no inconsiderable pro- 
portion of those who came to America, preferred the 
Presbyterian form of church government."* Previous 
to the year 1G40, according to Cotton Mather, four 
thousand Presbyterians had arrived in New England. 
" Of the two thousand Presbyterian ministers cast out 
of the Church of England, by the Act of Uniformity in 
1662, a considerable number, it is said, found refuge in 
New England." The immigrants, who had not enjoyed 
any separate ecclesiastical organization in England, 
were willing to unite in this country in a modified form 
of church government, (in which the respective parties 
relinquished certain of their peculiarities,) which was 
called Congregationalism. Trumbull, in speaking of 
the Council that formed the Saybrook Platform, says 
that some of the members were " in their sentiments 
nearly Presbyterians, 'f This is sufficiently proved 
by the Platform itself. Hence it is wrong to infer that 
emigrants from New England must, as a matter of 
course, have been Congregationalists, or that, if a min- 
ister came from New England, he could not have been 
a Presbyterian. 

If we could ascertain, with certainty, the particular 
denomination of the church at Hempstead, it would 
afford us, in my judgment, a much safer clue to the 
form, or principles, of church government adopted at 
the formation of this church. The Rev. Sylvester 
Woodbridge, Jr., minister of the Presbyterian Church in 

* Hodge's History of the Pres. Ch., p. 31, seq. 
t Hist, of Conn., Vol. I. p. 487. 



MR. PRUDDEN S MINISTRY. 25 

Hempstead, gives the following statements, in his His- 
torical Discourse, delivered in 1840. " The Rev. 
Richard Denton was a Presbyterian minister, of Coley 
Chapel, parish of Halifax, in the northern part of Eng- 
land." " That the church was Presbyterian is evident 
from Mr. Denton's known views ; from our having 
every reason to believe that a portion of the congre- 
gation were members of his church at Halifax ; from 
the name of the church, which has been borne from 
remote antiquity; and from the fact of the existence of 
elders from time immemorial." Mr. Denton removed 
to Hempstead in 1644, the year after the town was 
settled. Now if any of the first settlers of Jamaica 
were members of Mr. Denton's church — or if the set- 
tlement at Jamaica was at first regarded as included 
within the bounds of his congregation, which is not 
improbable — then we can understand the import of the 
expressions, in the articles of agreement with Mr. 
Prudden, " according to the rules of the Gospel in this 
toivn." The rules of the Gospel in this town were, to 
a moral certainty, the same as in the town from which 
the leading inhabitants, among them two sons of the 
minister, emigrated. 

It may be further stated that Mr. Prudden, when 
he finally removed from Jamaica, became minister of 
the Presbyterian church in Newark, N. J., which, ac- 
cording to Dr. McWhorter, was Presbyterian from 
the beginning, and, unquestionably, was such at the 
time Mr. Prudden was called. The Rev. Jeremiah 
Hobart, the successor of Mr. Prudden, had been min- 
ister of the Presbyterian church at Hempstead. The 
Rev. John Hubbard, who succeeded him, is always 
2 



26 MR. woodruff's ministry. 

called, in Smith's History, a Presbyterian. Almost 
immediately after the formation of the Presbytery of 
Philadelphia, we find this congregation making a call 
on one of its members — the Rev. George McNish, 
who was one of the original members or founders of 
that Presbytery. Such are the grounds that show it 
to be not altogether improbable that this church was 
Presbyterian from the beginning. I have dwelt thus 
long upon it, because it is a point of considerable his- 
torical interest. It should be added that it is not to be 
supposed that the business of the church was transact- 
ed according to all the forms of the Presbyterian 
Church as now established ; for it is to be remembered 
that the first Presbytery was not organized until long 
after this. 

We pass on to Jan. 13th, 1674, when it appears 
from the Records that the town desired " a positive 
answer" from Mr. Prudden whether he would remain 
with them as their minister ; his answer was " that he 
was now under an engagement to another people." 
They proceeded to settle with him, and he took his 
departure, after having been the minister here about 
four years. To what people he was under an en- 
gagement I have not been able to ascertain. The 
town immediately adopted measures of " inquiry after 
another minister ;" and on June 24th, 1675, we find 
them voting to give threescore pounds to Mr. 

WILLIAM WOODRUFF 

or Woodrop, together with the use of the " parsonage," 
and lands attached, to be their minister. He was one 
of the ministers ejected by the Act of Uniformity, in 



MR. PRUDDEn's second MINISTRY. 27 

1662, who found refuge in this country. He is men- 
tioned by Cotton Mather, who calls him Woodrop. 
He remained here but one year, when he removed, as 
Thompson asserts, to Pennsylvania. 

In June, 167G, the town appropriated forty acres of 
meadow, together with upland, for the use of a minis- 
ter. It is this land which is referred to in the Act of 
the town, 21st of April, 1753, and which is there said 
to have been continued, " for the use of a minister of 
the Presbyterian denomination, since that time." Un- 
der the same date, June 19th, 107G, articles of agree- 
ment are recorded, between the town of Jamaica and 
the Rev. John Prudden, who, it appears, had returned 
to this place, by which the town agreed to give him, 
" his heirs or assigns," certain lands provided he should 
discharge " the work of a minister for ten years ; his 
salary to be forty pounds and his firewood." Mr. 
Prudden had charge of the congregation from this time 
till 1692, making in all twenty years. He appears to 
have enjoyed the confidence and respect of the com- 
munity in a high degree. He was appointed a deputy 
from this town, on two separate occasions, to meet 
deputies from other towns, to consult on the public 
welfare, and transact business for the general good. 

Aug. 23d, 1692, Mr. Prudden received a call from 
the First Presbyterian Church, Newark, N. J., to suc- 
ceed Mr. Pierson, which he accepted. He continued 
the minister of that church till June 9th, 1699, when, 
for some cause, not now known, he was dismissed. 
He died at Newark, Dec. 11th, 1725. His epitaph is 
as follows : 



28 MR. prudden's second ministry. 

Here lies the body of the Rev. Mr. 

John Frudden, minister of the 
Gospel, ivho departed this life 
11 Dec. 1125, aged 80 years. 

Nor grace, nor favour fills my reins, 
lo, room for thee remains. 

Dr. McWhorter, in a sermon preached Jan. 1st, 
1801, says, that " he sustained a worthy character, as 
a man of" sense and rehgion, though he does not appear 
to have been a popular preacher." His descendants 
are numerous, and reside chiefly in Morris Co. N. J, ; 
some of whom are said to have been distinguished as 
worthy and useful members of society.* 

It was in the latter part of Mr. Prudden's ministry 
that the erection of the old stone church, which occu- 
pies so important a place in the history this congrega- 
tion, was commenced. 

Dec. Gth, 1C89. A town meeting called. It was 
there and then voted and concluded, that there shall be 
a Meeting House built in this town of Jamaica, sixty 
feet long and thirty feet wide, and every way else as 
shall be convenient and comely for a Meeting House. 

At another town meeting, held the following month, 
a committee was appointed to procure, and agree with 
workmen to construct the house. It does not appear 
to have been completed until the year 1G93. Lewis 
Morris, in a letter to the Venerable Society, represents 
the people of Jamaica as apj)lying to the Provincial 
Assembly, at this time, for an act to enable them to 

* Mr. Crane's MS. Hist. 



MR. Phillips's ministry. 29 

collect money for the completion of the work. Mr. 
Faitoute says that " from the date of the vane which 
was taken down from the steeple, because very much 
injured by the musket balls of the British soldiers, who 
were continually shooting at it as a mark, in the time 
of the late war, it appears to have been completed in 
1693 or 1699 ; two dates are given, as there is some 
difference in the opinion of those who saw the vane 
after it was taken down."* The true date, beyond all 
question, was 1693. This building stood near the mid- 
dle of the main street, not far from the head of what 
is now known as Union Hall street. It was a sub- 
stantial stone edifice, of a quadrangular form, with a 
pyramidal roof, and balcony in the centre ; and was 
used for a house of worship until the year 1813, when 
the present church was erected ; that is, for about one 
hundred and twenty years. This was the church for 
the possession of which the Presbyterians had such a 
struggle with the Episcopalians, for nearly a quarter of 
a century ; a full account of which will be given in the 
proper place. 

Oct. 25th, 1692, a call was given to Rev. Jeremiah 
Hobart, or Hubbart, minister of Hempstead, but he 
did not at this time see fit to accept. June 8th, 1693, 
" It was agreed to endeavour to procure Mr. Jonas 
Lott, minister ofDoubens,"t to be minister of Jamaica. 
But the next preacher was Mr. 

GEORGE PHILLIPS, 

who labored here about three years, from 1693 to 1696. 

* MS. Hist., written in 1793. 

i So it is written, but I have not been able to ascertain what place 
is meant. 



30 MR. hobart's ministry. 

He was a licentiate merely, and of course was not 
pastor of the church. He was a son of the Rev. 
Samuel Phillips, of Roxbury, Mass., and was born in 
1664. He graduated at Harvard in 1686.* He prob- 
ably left this place on the death of his father in 1696. 
He subsequently went to Brookhaven, where he was 
ordained in 1702, and continued pastor till his death, 
June 17th, 1739. He is said to have been a faithful 
preacher, and to have extended his labors to destitute 
places. The Hon. Silas Wood says of him that "he 
was distinguished for a peculiar vein of natural wit. 
His ordinary discourse was tinctured with this pecu- 
liarity ; and tradition has preserved many of his re- 
marks that exemplify it."f The Rev. 

JEREMIAH HOBART 

of Hempstead, to whom a call had been presented in 
1692, succeeded Mr. Phillips. As his name is sometimes 
written Hubbert in the Records, and Hubard, he has 
often been confounded with the Rev. John Hubbard, his 
successor. He was a son of the Rev. Peter Hobart, 
who came as one of the ejected ministers to New 
England, in 1635. The late Rev. John H. Hobart, 
D.D. a bishop of the Episcopal Church, is said to have 
sprung from the same family. 

Jeremiah Hobart was but five or six years of age, 
when his father emigrated to this country. He studied 
at Harvard, where he graduated in 1650. He com- 
menced his labors as a preacher of the Gospel at Tops- 
field, Mass., and was ordained at that place in 1672. 
He was called to Hempstead, May 6th, 1682, after that 

* Trien. Cat. t Hist, of L. I. 



MR. HOBART S MINISTRY. 31 

place had been destitute of stated preaching for almost 
twenty-five years. He became the minister of Jamaica, 
Sept. 13th, 1698. 

Sep. 13th, 1698. Joseph Smith and Jonas Wood 
were appointed to treat with his Excellency in and 
about settling and establishing Mr. Hobart among us in 
the work of the ministry. 

In explanation of this extract from the Records, it 
may be observed that the Governors of the colony, by 
their interpretation of the act of 1693, claimed that no 
minister could be settled without their special license. 
It was this disposition to meddle with ecclesiastical 
affairs, which led very soon after to such unhappy con- 
sequences in Jamaica. 

Mr. Hobart's ministry here was short, not continu- 
ing over one or two years. He went from this place 
to Haddam, Conn., where he was installed, Nov. 14th, 
1700, and where he died on the Lord's Day, March 
17th, 1717, aged 87, having preached on the morning 
of that day. His daughter, Sarah, was the mother of 
the celebrated David Brainard. Mather, in his Mas- 
nalia, says of him that " he read over the Bible, six 

TIMES, EVERY YEAR ; NEVERTHELESS, HE DID USE TO 
BAY THAT EVERY TIME HE READ THE BiBLE, HE OBSERVED 
OR COLLECTED SOMETHING WHICH HE NEVER DID BEFORE." 



32 MR. Hubbard's ministry. 



CHAPTER II. 

1700—1734. 

John Hubbard. — Called by the first Vestry. — Controversy with the 
Episcopalians begins. — Valuable property. — Extracts of letters of 
Messrs. Thomas and Urquhart. — Cotton Mather. — Hon. William 
Smith's account of the outrage ; N. Y. Merc, account. — Mr. Bar- 
tow. — Mr. Hubbard's premature death. — Mr. Urquhart inducted. — 
Francis Goodhue succeeds Mr. Hubbard. — His early death. — Ele- 
gant lines. — George McNish called to be minister. — Rev. John 
Hampton imprisoned at Jamaica. — Presbyterians get possession of 
their church for a short time. — Parsonage and glebe. — Mr. Poyer 
inducted. — Gov. Hunter refuses to eject the tenants of the Parson- 
age. — Mr. Poyer and the Episcopal missionaries dissatisfied. — Let- 
ters of Mr. Poyer. — Memorial of the Clergy. — Gov. Hunter to the 
Secretary. — Col. Morris's Letter. — Col. Heathcote's. — Record of the 
Court in Mr. Poyer's suit. — Difficulties of Mr. Poyer carried before 
the Queen. — Bishop of London reproves Mr. Poyer. — Mr. Poyer re- 
covers from the Church Wardens. — Mr. McNish founds the Presby- 
tery of L. L — Deputed by the Synod to Great Britain. — His death. — 
Rob. Cross succeeds him. — The Church regained after a due course 
of law. — Col. Morris suspended from the office of Chief Justice. 

The Church appears to have been without a pastor 
for a year or two after Mr. Hobart's removal. It was 
during the ministry of his successor, the Rev. 

JOHN HUBBARD, 

that the memorable controversy for the church property 



MR. Hubbard's ministry. 33 

commenced. He was born in Ipswich, Mass., in 1677, 
and graduated at Cambridge in 1695; he was settled 
in this place in Feb., 1702, under the act of 1693 for 
the settling of the ministry. By this act Queen's Co. 
was divided into two precincts or parishes. The parish 
of Jamaica included the towns of Jamaica, Flushing, 
and Newtown, and was required to raise £60 by a tax 
on all the freeholders, for the support of the ministry, 
and to elect church wardens and vestrymen. This act, 
in the parish of Jamaica, had lain dormant nine years, 
or until the accession of Lord Cornbury to the govern- 
ment. In Jan., 1702, the first vestrymen and church 
wardens were chosen, who were all Presbyterians ; 
and the following month they proceeded, as empowered 
by the act under which they were elected, to call Mr. 
Hubbard to be the minister of the place. For forty 
years the people of Jamaica had been of one mind in 
matters ecclesiastical ; and, up to the date just men- 
tioned, it is not probable that a single Episcopalian had 
settled in the town. " There was not," says the late 
Silas Wood, Esq.,* " an Episcopal church or an Epis- 
copal minister in the colony of New-York, at the time 
of the conquest in 1664, and if there were any Episco- 
palians among the inhabitants, the number must have 
been very small. The inhabitants belonged either to 
the Dutch Reformed Church, or were English Non-con- 
formists." The Episcopal population was very much 
confined, at first, to the city of New- York ; and the 
first Episcopal church in the province was erected in 
that city in 1696. The Rev. Mr. Vesey, the first Epis- 
copal minister, performed divine service, for the first 

* Hist. ofL. I., p. 41. 

2* 



34 MR. HUUBARDS MINISTRY. 

time, in Trinity Church, Feb. 0th, 1G97. "Although 
the statutes of uniformity," continues Wood, " did not 
extend to the colonies, and aUhough the rehgious con- 
stitution of the colony * was a perfect equality among 
Protestants of all denominations, yet the colony gov- 
ernors struggled to give some legal ascendency to the 
Episcopal over other denominations. They incorpo- 
rated their churches, which they refused to the Presby- 
terians. They obstructed the Presbyterian ministers 
who came into the colony, in the exercise of their func- 
tions, and, under pretence of ecclesiastical authority, 
required them to apply to them for license to preach." 
As late as 1773, according to the same author, not 
more than one in fifteen of the population of the colony 
was supposed to be Episcopalians. The people never- 
theless were taxed to support Ihe Episcopal ministry, 
exclusively, under the act of 1G93 ; an act which the 
Assembly declared was passed for the benefit of the 
Dutch Reformed and the Presbyterians, equally as for 
the Episcopalians. 

It is admitted that the old stone meeting-house and 
parsonage were built by the town, and the parsonage 
lands were given by the town ; but this was done when 
the inhabitants all belonged to the same denomination. 
This property, it may be remarked, in passing, was 
valuable :t according to a letter of Cotton Mather to 

* See Charter. 

t Extract of a Report on the State of the Church in the Province of 
New- York, Anno 1704, suhniitted to the Society for Propagating the 
Gospel in Foreign Parts, by C. Congreve. 
" Queen's County : 

" At Jamaica there is a tolerable good Church built of stone, a Parson- 
age house, an orchard and 200 acres of land belonging to it, and .£60 



ME. HUBBARD .S MINISTRY. 35 

Messrs. Robinson and Reynolds, of London, the par- 
sonage alone was estimated to be worth fifteen hundred 
pounds. The valuable glebe attached is, no doubt, to 
be included in this estimate. There is not the least 
evidence that there was a single member of the Church 
of England residing in Jamaica at the time the church 
was built, and this property was set apart for the sup- 
port of a minister. The Rev. Mr. Thomas, Episcopal 
missionary at Hempstead, thus wrote to the Society for 
Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts, March 1st, 
1705: "The people of Hempstead are better disposed 
to peace and civility than they are at Jamaica, yet my 
lord's (Cornbury) countenance, next to the providence 
of Heaven, is my chiefest safety. I have scarce a man 
in the parish, truly steady and real to the interest and 
promotion of the church, any further than they aim at 
the favour or dread the displeasure of his lordship." If 
there was scarce a man at Hempstead favorable to 
Episcopacy, where the people were so much better 
disposed than at Jamaica, it is absurd to maintain that 
Episcopalians could have had any hand in building the 
church, or a valid claim to any of the church property 
in this place. It is not improbable that there were 

per ann. settled by Act of Assembly for maintenance of the minister, 
who is Mr. William Urquliart, lately arrived. There is in the Church 
a Common-Prayer Book and a Cushion, but no Vestments, nor vessels 
for the Communion Table. The church wardens and vestry are 

chosen by a majority of the parish, who are chiefly [blank in 

the MS.] and the church wardens, when chosen, would never qualify 
themselves according to law, and refuse soon to provide bread and wine 
for the Holy Sacrament, at which there is now about twenty communi- 
cants, in a great measure brought over to an entire conformity by the 
Rev. Mr. Mott. There is in this parish near 2000 souls." 



36 MR. Hubbard's ministry. 

some here, as at Hempstead, who, after the strenuous 
exertions of the missionaries for four or five years, and 
the violent acts of usurpation on the part of the Go- 
vernor, would, to secure the favor of his lordship, pro- 
fess to be Episcopalians. The following is an extract 
of a joint letter, dated July 4th, 1705, of Messrs. Ur- 
quhart, of Jamaica, and Thomas, of Hempstead, to the 
Society : " The ancient settlers have transplanted 
themselves from New England, and do still keep a close 
correspondence, and are buoyed up by schismatical 
instruction * from that interest, which occasions all the 
disturbance and opposition we meet with in both our 
parishes. They have hitherto been used to a dissenting 
ministry, and they still support one at Jamaica, which 
has a most pestilential influence over our people, who 

* Cotton Mather's Letter to Messrs. Robinson and Reynolds shows 
that he took a deep interest in the affairs of the church at Jamaica. 
The following is an extract : " At the same time there is a town called 
Jamaica on Long Island, under the government aforesaid ; a town con- 
sisting of considerably above an hundred families, and exemplary for all 
Christian knowledge and goodness, and a church with a worthy pastor 
in it. About half a score of families (and of meaner character) in this 
town declared for the Church of England, and thereupon a minister of 
their profession was sent to them (one Urquhart), who is maintained by 
the aforesaid society. But this little company having the advantage 
(right or wrong) to be uppermost, took away from the dissenters (if it 
be proper to call such a disproportionate number so) their meeting- 
house, computed to be worth six hundred pounds, and compelled them 
to build another. They also seized the Parsonage, which had been until 
now enjoyed by the town, and is esteemed worth fifteen hundred pounds. 
— The good people there do adorn the doctrine of God their Saviour by 
a most laudable silence and wonderful patience under these things. But 
if such things proceed, that noble Society for the Propagation of Religion 
in America will greatly wound religion, and their own reputation also, 
which ought to be for ever venerable." This was dated 14th Oct., 1 706. 



MR. Hubbard's ministry. 37 

from their cradles were disaffected to conformity." 
Nothing, therefore, can be more evident than that those 
who had been trained up under " a dissenting ministry," 
and who were disaffected to conformity from their cra- 
dles, were the men who built the church and gave the 
property in question. To some account of the contro- 
versy which took place respecting this property, and 
which lasted for twenty-five years, I shall now proceed. 
I quote first from the History of New- York by Wm. 
Smith, formerly of New-York, and late Chief Justice 
of Lower Canada. 

" The summer following (the arrival of Lord Corn- 
bury, in 1702,) was remarkable for the uncommon mor- 
tality which prevailed in the city of New- York, and 
makes a grand epoch among our inhabitants distin- 
guished by the ' time of the great sickness.' On this 
occasion Lord Cornbury had his residence and court at 
Jamaica, a pleasant village on Long Island, distant 
about twelve miles from the city. 

« * * * 'Yhe mhabitants of Jamaica had erected 
an edifice for the worship of God, and enjoyed a hand- 
some donation of a parsonage-house and glebe, for the 
use of their minister. After the ministry act was pass- 
ed by Col. Fletcher, in 1693, a few Episcopalians crept 
into the town, and viewed the Presbyterian church with 
a jealous eye. The town vote, in virtue of which the 
building had been erected, contained no clause to pre- 
vent its being hereafter engrossed by any other sect. 
The Episcopal party, who knew this, formed a design 
of seizing the edifice for themselves, which they shortly 
after carried into execution, by entering the church be- 
tween the morning and evening service, while the 
Presbyterian minister and his congregation were in 
perfect security, unsuspicious of the zeal of their adver- 
saries, and a fraudulent ejectment on a day consecrated 
to sacred rest. 



38 MR. Hubbard's ministry. 

" Great outrage ensued among the people, for the 
contention being ])ro Avis et Focis, was animating and 
important. The original proprietors of the house tore 
up their seats, and afterwards got the key, and the pos- 
session of the church, which were shortly after again 
taken from them by force and violence. In these con- 
troversies the governor abetted the Episcopal zealots, 
and harassed the others by numberless prosecutions, 
heavy fines, and long imprisonments, through fear of 
which many who had been active in the dispute fled 
out of the province. Lord Cornbvu'y's noble descent 
and education should have prevented him from taking 
part in so ignominious a quarrel ; but his lordship's 
sense of honor and justice was as weak and indelicate 
as his bigotry was rampant and incontrollable ; and 
hence we find him guilty of an act complicated of a 
number of vices, which no man could have perpetrated 
without violence to the very slightest remains of gene- 
rosity and justice. When his excellency retired to 
Jamaica, Mr. Hubbard, the Presbyterian minister, lived 
in the best house of the town. His lordship begged 
the loan of it for the use of his own family, and the 
clergyman put himself to no small inconvenience to 
favor the governor's request ; but in return for the gen- 
erous benefaction, his lordship perfidiously delivered the 
parsonage-house into the hands of the Episcopal party, 
and encouraged one Cardwell, the sheriff, a mean fel- 
low, who afterward put an end to his own life, to seize 
upon the glebe, which he surveyed into lots, and farmed 
for the benefit of the Episcopal party. These tyranni- 
cal measures justly inflamed the indignation ol" the in- 
jured sufterers, and that again the more embittered his 
lordship against them. They resented, and he prose- 
cuted : nor did he confine his pious rage to the people 
of Jamaica ; he detested all who were of the same deno- 
mination ; nay, averse to every sect except his own, he 
insisted that neither the ministers nor schoolmasters of 
the Dutch, the most numerous persuasion in the pro- 



MR. Hubbard's ministry. 39 

vince, had a right to preach or instruct without his 
gubernatorial Ucense ; and some of them tamely sub- 
mitted to his unauthoritative rule." — Vol. I. pp. 169- 
172. 

I quote next from No. 17, of a Series of Articles, 
under the head of " Watchtower," contained in the 
New-York Mercury for June 2, 1755. These Articles, 
as I have been informed by a literary friend, were 
written by Wm. Livingstone, J. Moran Scott, and Wm. 
Smith, who gave £50 a year for the use of the first 
page of the aforesaid paper. 

" Mr. Hubbard, the Presbyterian minister, having 
preached to his congregation on Sunday morning, dis- 
missed them as usual, altogether unsuspicious of any 
evil designs against him or his people. In the after- 
noon he returned to his church, and to his great sur- 
prise and astonishment found an Episcopal clergyman, 
a person doubtless of a very pacific spirit, reading the 
liturgy to a handful of auditors, who had devoutly 
seated themselves in the pews. Mr. Hubbard had not 
the least intimation of the trick, till he had actually en- 
tered the church, and upon the discovery of it left his 
pious successor to the sole possession of the pulpit, 
whilst he himself peaceably retired to an orchard, 
where he preached a sermon to the graver part of his 
congregation, who followed him. All of them were 
not such passive and self-denying Christians : a tumult 
began at the church door, and many ran in and tore 
up the seats of their families, for which some were af- 
terwards rigorously prosecuted, and others who escaped 
underwent a year's banishment. 

" Not long after this pious ejectment, the Presbyte- 
rians got the key of the church, regained possession, 
and locked up the doors. But early in the morning, on 
the following Sabbath, several heroic Episcopalians, 



40 MR. Hubbard's ministry. 

with proper instruments* for the purpose, forcibly broke 
open the church doors, and retained possession till the 
parson attended the puMic service. The Presbyterians 
after this made several fruitless attempts to possess 
themselves of their church, but the prosecutions which 
ensued on their endeavors were so heavy, that they 
thought proper to desist from any further attempts, and 
the Episcopalians held the possession of it for nineteen 
or twenty years after, till it was recovered from them, 
with the parsonage house, and glebe, in a due course of 
law, about the year 1727. 

" His excellency Gov. Morris, was then Chief Judge 
of the Supreme Court of New- York, and sat on the 
bench at that trial. Such was the resentment of the 
Church party on the loss of the verdict, that Morris 
himself did not escape their malignant aspersions, but, 
so late as 1734, was put to the trouble of refuting the 
charge of partiality on the trial, contained in a public 
representation, sent home against him while he was in 
England soliciting his restoration to the Chief Justice's 
place, from which Gov. Cosby had removed him. 

" The parsonage house and glebe were taken away 
in a manner though less violent, yet more iniquitous. 
Lord Cornbury, to flee the dreadful mortality, which 
triumphed in New- York City in 1702, retired to Ja- 
maica, and in a friendly manner entreated Mr. Hub- 
bard for the use of the parsonage house during his 
stay in the country. The clergyman generously put 
himself to inconvenience to oblige him. On his return 
to New-York, Lord Cornbury put the church party 
in possession of the house. 

" Usage so base enkindled resentment in almost every 
man's breast, and the country was full of strife and 
contention. Cardwell, the sherift', under protection of 
Lord Cornbury, was a great instrument of his arbitrary 
measures. He seized the glebe, surveyed, and divided 

* Mr. Faitoute says in his MS. history, written in 1793, that he had 
been informed by an aged gentleman that a crowbar was used. 



MR. HUBBARD S MINISTRY. 41 

it into lots, which he leased out for the benefit of the 
Episcopal denomination. Every attempt to recover 
their rights plunged the people into new^ difficulties, — 
They were indicted and informed' against, fined and 
imprisoned ; and many to escape the fury of the gov- 
ernment, fled into the neighboring colonies. 

" Incensed at last by a series of oppressions, the civil 
vestry and church wardens of Jamaica, who were 
elected by the major vote of the inhabitants, called 
Mr. McNish, a Presbyterian clergyman, to be their 
minister, hoping thereby to exempt themselves from 
the annual tax, raised by virtue of the Ministry Act, 
passed March, 1C93. The project, for several years, 
had its expected success. The vestrymen, to avoid the 
censure of the law, annually raised the salary as had 
been usual. But Mr. McNish refused to receive it, 
though far the greatest part was a tax on his own con- 
gregation, and as often as it was offered, presented it 
to the people, according to their proportionable assess- 
ments. Offended at this stratagem, the Episcopalians 
contrived to defeat it, and again to recover the tax for 
their own benefit. To that end the justices of Hempstead 
who were creatures of the Governor arbitrarily intruded 
their votes amongst the vestry of Jamaica, and carried 
a major voice for appropriating the salary to the Church 
parson. But as their right of sitting there was pro- 
tested against by the vestry, Lord^Cornbury, to secure 
a major vote for the Episcopal minister, commissioned 
no less than 16 Justices of the Peace for the single 
parish of Jamaica. This artifice was effectual, the 
number of vestrymen, church wardens, and justices, 
being only twelve. But what right these tools of ar- 
bitrary power had by virtue of the Act of Assembly, 
or any other law, to vote with the vestry for the sup- 
port of a minister whom they had not called, remains 
to this day an inexplicable mystery." 

That the foregoing extracts contain a true account 



42 MR. Hubbard's ministry. 

of the violent proceedings, under Lord Cornbury, 
against the Presbyterians of Jamaica, is made evident 
from the letters and reports of the Episcopal missiona- 
ries themselves. The subjoined is part of a Letter 
from Mr. Bartow to the Secretary of the Society for 
Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts. 

" W. Chester, N. Y., 1st Dec. 1707. (Sic in MS.) 

" The first half year being winter I lodged at a 
public house preaching once every Sunday and upon 
occasion visiting the sick. After winter was over, I 
lived at Col. Graham's six miles from the Church and 
all the summer preacht twice every Sunday sometimes 
at West Chester and sometimes at Jamaica on Long 
Island about - miles distant from Mr. Graham's at my 
own charge, nor have I had any board given me since 
I came, and once I met with great disturbance at Ja- 
maica. Mr. Hobbart, their Presbyterian minister, hav- 
ing been for some time at Boston returned to Jamaica 
the Saturday night as I came to it, and sent to me at 
my lodging (being then in company with our Chief 
Justice Mr. Mompesson and Mr. Carter her Majesty's 
Comptroller) to know if I intended to preach on the 
morrow. 1 sent him answer that I did intend it. — The 
next morning the bell rang, as usual, but before the last 
time of ringing Mr. Hobbart was got into the Church, 
and had begun his service of which notice was given 
me whereupon I went into the Church and walked 
straightway to the pew expecting Mr. Hobbart would 
desist being he knew I had orders from the Govern- 
ment to officiate there, but he persisted and I forbore 
to make any interruption. In the afternoon I pre- 
vented him beginning the service of the Church of 
England before he came who w"as so surprised when 
after he came to the church door and saw me perform- 
ing divine service that he suddenly started back and 
went aside to an orchard hard by, and sent in some to 



MR. Hubbard's ministry. 43 

give the word that Mr. Hobbart would preach under a 
tree, then I perceived a whispering thro' the church, 
and an uneasiness of many people some going out, 
some seemed amazed not yet determined whether to 
stay. In the mean time some that had gone out re- 
turned again for their seats and then we had a shame- 
ful disturbance : hauling and tugging of seats, shoving 
one the other off, carrying them out and returning 
again for more, so that I was fain to leave off till the 
disturbance was over, and a separation was made by 
which time I had lost about half of the congregation, 
the rest remaining devout and attentive the whole time 
of the service ; after which we lock't the church and 
committed the key into the hands of the sheriff; we 
were no sooner got into an adjoining house but some 
persons came to demand the key of their meeting-house 
which being denied they went and broke the glass 
window, and put a boy in to open the door and so put 
in their seats and took away the pew-cushion saying 
they would keep that however for their own minister ; 
the scolding and wrangling that ensued are by me inef- 
fable. — The next time I saw my Lord Cornbury he 
thanked me and said he would do the church and me 
justice, accordingly he summoned Mr. Hobbart and 
the head of the faction before him and forbad Mr. 
Hobbart ever more to preach in that Church, for in 
regard it was built by a public tax it did appertain to 
the established church (which it has quietly remained 
ever since and now in possession of Rev'd Brother, Mr. 
Urquhart.) My Lord Cornbury threatened them all 
with the penalty of the statute for disturbing divine 
service, but upon their submission and promise of fu- 
ture quietness and peace he pardoned the offence." 

I have given the date of the above letter as it is in 
the manuscript from which it was copied ; but it is 
manifestly an error, inasmuch as Mr. Hubbard was 
dead nearly two years before the date given, and Mr. 



44 MR. Hubbard's ministry. 

Urquhart was put in possession of the Church in 1704. 
The letter, perhaps, was written in 1703, or more 
probably, 1704 — giving a review of the writer's labors 
for the preceding year. 

How the youthful pastor was affected by such trou- 
bles as these we are not informed. His conduct when 
he so unexpectedly found the Rev. Mr. Bartow read- 
ing the liturgy in his pulpit, in retiring to an adjoining 
orchard and inviting his people to accompany him, 
there to worship Him who dwelleth not in temples 
made with hands, proves him to have been an amiable 
and discreet man. It is not improbable, however, that 
the failure of his health may have had some connexion 
with his peculiar trials. He died at the early age of 
twenty-eight years. In the Boston "News Letter," 
No. 79. Oct. 22, 1705 appeared the following : 

"Jamaica on Long Island, Oct. 11. On Fryday, 
the 5th current, dyed here the Rev. Mr. John Hub- 
bard, Pastor of a Church in this place, aged 28 years 
9 months, wanting 4 days." Thompson says respect- 
ing him " he was one of the most excellent and amia- 
ble youths which New England produced, and his 
death was extensively and deeply lamented." 

He was the first minister buried in this town. But 
no monument or headstone marks the spot where his 
ashes repose. It is to be hoped that the prosperous 
congregation whose forefathers he served, in a time of 
adversity, will, before long, cause a suitable monument 
to be erected to his memory, and that of his immediate 
successors. 

The Presbyterian congregation, after they had been 
excluded from their church edifice, worshipped, as Mr. 



MR. Hubbard's ministry. 45 

Faitoute says* he had been told, by aged people, in a 
building at the eastern extremity of the village. In 
1702 the Rev. Patrick Gordon, the first Episcopal min- 
ister, arrived from England, but he died before he could 
be inducted, " and was buried," says Dr. Humphreys, 
Secretary to the Honorable Society, in his History of 
the Society, "in a Meeting-House in Jamaica." The 
Rev. Mr. Bartow, of Westchester, as we have shown, 
by a letter from his own hand, is undoubtedly entitled 
to the honor of having figured so conspicuously in the 
affair of taking possession of Mr. Hubbard's pulpit. 
After Mr. Gordon's, death, Mr, Vesey, the first rector 
of Trinity Church, N. Y., supplied Jamaica with " con- 
stant lectures ;"f and other Episcopal ministers in the 
province, rendered occasional services. A Mr. Honey- 
man, against whom charges,^ seriously affecting his 
moral character, had been made, and a Mr. Mott, seve- 
rally preached for a short time, when the Rev. William 
Urquhart arrived and was inducted as rector, July 4th, 
1704. Mr. Hubbard was, at that time, in possession 
of the parsonage ; but he was ordered by Cornbury 
" to deliver up the same to Mr. Urquhart, which ac- 
cordingly was done quietly and peaceably,"^ and Mr. 
Urquhart remained in possession till his death, which 
took place in Aug., 1709. Mr. Johnson, the present 
rector, is undoubtedly in error in stating as he does, on 
the cover of the "Rector's Offering" for 1845, that 
Mr. U. died " Nov. 1706." The Rev. 

* MS. Hist. 

t Petition of the Clergy to the Bishop of London. 
t Mr. Urquhart's Letter to the Sec. of the V. S. 
§ Petition of Epis. Clergy. 



46 MR. Goodhue's ministry. 

FRANCIS GOODHUE 

was Mr. Hubbard's successor in the ministry. It 
would not have been surprising if the congregation, 
their church and parsonage occupied by others, and 
their minister in the grave, had remained for some 
time in a destitute and scattered condition. Such 
was the effect of similar arbitrary proceedings at 
Hempstead. Mr. Goodhue was settled the same year 
of Mr. Hubbard's death. He was a native of the same 
place, and probably had been a companion of Hubbard 
in childhood, as he was but one year younger. He was 
a son of Dea. William and Hannah Goodhue, and was 
born in Chebacca parish, Ipswich, Mass., Oct. 4th, 
1678. His grandfather, WiUiam, was one of the most 
influential and respectable men in the colony of Mas- 
sachusetts, whose " many virtues " are said to have 
" conferred honor upon his name and family." Fran- 
cis Goodhue graduated at Harvard in 1699, and was 
settled at Jamaica in 1705. At the close of the summer 
of 1707, he went from this place on a journey to New 
England ; little did he or his people think that he was 
to return no more. He died of fever on his way, at 
Rehoboth, Mass., near Providence, R. I., where he was 
buried. Seekonk was the Indian name of the place ; 
and in 1812 its western section was incorporated as a 
separate town, and is now called by this name. 

The ministry of Hubbard, and that of Goodhue, 
were short, but they were doubtless eminently useful 
in keeping the congregation together, under its adverse 
circumstances. It is deeply affecting to contemplate 



MR. McNish's ministry. 47 

the situation of the congregation called thus to mourn 
over the early graves of two ministers, who, having 
been pleasant and lovely in their lives, in death were 
not far divided. 

A literary friend has kindly furnished me with the 
following elegant lines on Mr. Goodhue, taken from 
the Boston News Letter of Feb. 28, 1723. 

Libertas nomen ; bonitas conjuncta colori 

Cognomen prtebent ; Insula Longa gregem. 
Nascitur Ipsvici ; dissolvitur inter eundum ; 

Seconchte lecto molliter ossa cubant. 
Doctrina, officium, pietas, adamata juventus, 

Nil contra jussam convaluerenecem, 
Pars potior sedes procedit adire beatus 

Gaudens placato semper adesse Deo. 

Which may be thus translated. 

Liberty gives him a name (Francis) ; good joined to hue a 
surname ; Long Island a flock. Born at Ispwich, he dies 
whilst travelling. His bones softly repose in their bed at See- 
konk. Learning, sacred office, piety, amiable youth could 
avail nothing against death decreed. The immortal part 
enters into Paradise, rejoicing to be forever in the presence of 
God reconciled. 

For two or three years, the congregation appears to 
have been vacant, but in the spring* of 1710, the Rev. 

GEORGE McNISH 

was called to be minister. He was a native of Scot- 
land or Ireland, and came to this country in 1705, with 
the Rev. Francis Makemie, often styled the father of 

* The case of , and opinion &c. referred to in Gov. Hunter's 

Letter, 25th Feb., 1711. 



48 MR. McNish's ministry. 

the Presbyterian Church in this country. The Rev. 
John Hampton came, at the same time, with Mr. 
McNish — ^both of them no doubt induced by Mr. Ma- 
kemie, who had resided many years in this country, and 
who visited Europe expressly to prevail on ministers 
to come and settle here. Messrs. Makemie and 
Hampton were the two Presbyterian ministers who 
were imprisoned and fined by Lord Cornbury in 1706 
for preaching without a license from him. Mr. Hamp- 
ton was arrested at Newtown, where he had preached, 
and was brought to Jamaica and imprisoned in the 
Presbyterian Church, over night ; and, the next day, 
marched to New- York. 

In June, 1706, by order of Gov. Seymour, of Mary- 
land, the Somerset County Court licensed Messrs. 
McNish and Hampton. 

Upon the removal of Col. Ingolsby, who adminis- 
tered the government for a short time, after the death 
of Lord Lovelace in 1709, the supreme authority de- 
volved on Gerardus Beekman, Esq., President of the 
Council. He was not under the influence of the big- 
otry which had actuated the English governors, and 
the Presbyterians at once availed themselves of the op- 
portunity to take possession of their church. There 
was no Episcopal incumbent at that time, the place 
being supplied " every other Sunday " by the Rev. Mr. 
Vesey, Mr. Sharp, and the missionaries in the province 
of New- York,"* Soon after, and before the arrival of 
an Episcopal minister for the place, the parsonage 
and glebe also passed into the possession of the Pres- 
byterians, the rightful proprietors, and, notwithstanding 
* Mr. Bartow's Letter to Secretary of the Ven, Society. 



MR. McNISh's ministry., 49 

the strenuous efforts that were made, never again were 
wrested from them. Possession was secured in the 
following manner : the parsonage was tenanted by the 
widow of Mr. Urquhart ; she surrendered it to the 
representatives of the Presbyterian congregation, but 
was soon afterwards re-admitted as a tenant to them. 
Her daughter had married a young student of theology, 
a Presbyterian, of the name of Wolsey, who resided 
with her ; she remained their tenant until the Presby- 
terian minister was ready to take possession. 

It was during the brief occupancy of the church 
edifice, in the spring of 1710, that the wardens and 
vestrymen of Jamaica, who were Presbyterians, gave 
a call to Mr. McNish. This gentleman was one of 
the original members of the Presbytery of Philadelphia;, 
the first formed in America. He preached first to the 
people at Monokin and Wicomico, in Maryland, who 
presented a call to him ; but it appears from the minutes 
of the Presbytery held in 1710, that Mr. McNish had 
not, at that time, accepted the call. At the meeting of 
the Presbytery in 1711, the call from Jamaica was put 
into his hands, and " 'twas determined to leave his af- 
fair respecting Jamaica and Patuxent to himself, with 
advice not to delay to fix himself somewhere." This 
minute makes it quite evident that he never became 
the settled pastor at Monokin. Some time in 1711, he 
became the minister of Jamaica ; although there can 
be no doubt that he had frequently supplied the place 
during the preceding year. 

The Presbyterians, however, were not long permit- 
ted to retain the use of their house of worship. Their 
adversaries succeeded in ejecting them ; and six of 

3 



50 MR. McNISn's MINISTRY. 

their number were arrested and brought before the 
magistrates. They were, however, set at hberty, on 
their own recognisances, to appear at the next sessions. 
They were fined only three shilHngs each, and even 
their fines were remitted by the President and Council. 
The efforts of the Episcopalians to re-possess them- 
selves of the parsonage and glebe were not so success- 
ful. They made application to a magistrate for re- 
dress, who issued a warrant to the sheriff for apprehend- 
ing the offenders ; but it so happened that this officer 
was now a Presbyterian, and he replied to the Justice 
that "it was against his conscience to execute the pre- 
cept." The sequel will show that their persevering 
attempts, under the administration of Gov. Hunter, 
were equally unsuccessful, and that the property of the 
Church, other than the house of worship, was never 
again in their possession. Mr. McNish, on accepting 
the call which had been given him, had the parsonage 
and glebe lands confirmed to him by a vote of the 
town. One Mr. Samuel Clowes entered his protest 
against this vote of the town ; he is said to have been 
one of the heroic party, who, in Mr. Hubbard's time, 
forcibly broke open the doors of the Presbyterian 
Church. 

The Rev. Thomas Poyer, who is said to have been 
a grandson of Col. Poyer, who fell in the defence of 
Pembroke Castle, in the time of Oliver Cromwell, was 
the successor of Mr. Urquhart. He arrived in the 
colony in the summer of 1710, and was inducted (as 
the phrase was) by power from Col. Hunter, July 18th 
of that year. The Governor claimed the authority of 
putting Mr. Poyer in possession of the Church in dis- 



MR. McNISIl's MINISTRY. 51 

regard of the rights of those whose property it was, but 
he refused to assume the responsibility of ejecting 
tenants a la Cornhury, by his gubernatorial mandate. 
And in this determination he was sustained by the 
Chief Justice Mompesson, who gave his opinion in 
writing that it would " a high crime and misdemean- 
our" to put Mr. Poyer in possession of the parsonage 
and lands otherwise than by due course of law. But 
this part of the history will be best related in the very 
language of the documents, from which it is derived. 
These documents will disclose the fact that whilst 
Gov. Hunter was as devoted a member of the Church 
of England as any of the early Governors. Mr Poyer 
and many of the Episcopal missionaries were not a 
little disappointed that he refused to adopt the peremp- 
tory and high-handed measures of Lord Cornbury to- 
wards the Presbyterians. 

Mr. Poyer to the Secretary of the V. S. 

(extract.) 
Jamaica, on Lg. Island, 5th Oct. I7l0. 

Honoured Sir, My predecessor's Widow has not 

dealt kindly by me, for the day that I was expected in 
this town she delivered up the parsonage house to the 
Dissenters. 

From the same to the same. 
(extract.) 
Jamaica, Lg. Island, 2d May, 1711. 

Honoured Sir, 1 have great hopes that there 

will more come over to our Church notwithstanding 
the many enemies and discouragements I daily meet 
withall, of which I have in a former hinted to you, but 
wrote more fully to the Right Honourable and Right 
Reverend Bishop of London who has a perfect and 



52 MR. McNish's ministry. 

true state of the case which I hope when duly con- 
sidered will induce the Honourable Society to assert 
the right of the Church here ; that I may be support- 
ed with my salary, due here by an act of the country, 
one penny of which has not hitherto been paid to me 
but on the contrary raised and given to one Mr. George 
McNish an Independent North Britain preacher who 
has had the assurance, in the face of the country, to 
aver that the Bishop of London has no power here. 

The foregoing extract proves that Mr. McNish had 
been employed to supply the pulpit in Jamaica previous 
to May 1711, although it is evident he was not install- 
ed as pastor till after the meeting of Presbytery in 
September of that year. 

Memorial of the Clergy, SfC, relating to Mr. Poyer 
and the Church of Jamaica. 

(extract.)]! 

To the Right Honourable and Right Reverend Father 
in God, Henry Lord Bishop of London. The me- 
morial of the Clergy of the Colonies of New- York, 
New Jersey and Philadelphia, in America, 

Humbly Sheweth Conformable to instructions 

from his late majesty King William, to the then Governor 
for the encouragement of Religion in general and 
the Established Church in particular, and to settle 
parishes within the said province (New- York) in the 
year 1693 an act of General Assembly passed whereby 
it was enacted that in the several cities and counties 
therein mentioned there should be called and Liducted 
and Established a sufficient protestant ministry amongst 
which one was to be for Jamaica, and the two adjacent 
towns, and another for Hempstead, and its adjacent 
towns, but so unhappy was this province as to remain 
a scattered people without any true Shepherd till the 



MR. mcnish's ministry. 53 

year 1697, when the Rev. Mr. Vesey came to the city 
of New-York. 

Nevertheless it is confessed that they have 

made use of independent and sometimes itinerant 
preachers in no wise ordained, out of pure necessity 
for want of Orthodox preachers, &c. 

In the year 1702 came from England the Reverend 
Patrick Gordon to the Church at Jamaica, who, before 
he could be inducted was snatched away by death from 
those people to their unspeakable loss, which, by a pe- 
tition signed by upwards of fifty inhabitants to his then 
Excellency, Lord Cornbury, (that noble patron of the 
Church here) they did sufficiently express, and pray his 
Lordship to give such directions to the Rev. Mr. . . . Ve- 
sey that they might have constant lectures amongst them 
until that loss shall be made up to them, by her Majesty, 
which would tend to the advancement of true religion 
and the best of Churches, and the reconciling their un- 
happy differences, the which Mr. Vesey willingly and 
faithfully performed, till the year 1704, when the Rev. 
Mr. Urquhart was established and inducted in the said 
Church, by the then Governor, Lord Cornbury. But 
one Mr. Hubbard, an independent minister, being then 
in possession of the parsonage house, his Lordship 
ordered him to deliver up the same to Mr. Urquhart, 
which accordingly teas done, quietly and peaceably, 
without any force, and was enjoyed peaceably by the 
said Mr. Urquhart, for several years, and the Inde- 
pendents themselves seemed to rest satisfied so far that 
they unanimously, at their own expense, built them- 
selves a Meeting House in the same town which they 
now use and enjoy. 



It is a noteworthy reason that is here given in 
proof that the Presbyterians (the appellation " Inde- 
pendents" is used in the reports and letters of the Epis- 
copal missionaries, long after Mr. McNish was settled, 



54 MR. mcnish's ministry. 

and the church, beyond all controversy, was Presbyte- 
terian) were satisfied to see their minister turned out 
of the Parsonage, that they unanimously, and " at their 
own expense," too, went and built themselves a meeting 
house. But the memorial proceeds : 

After the death of Mr. Urquhart there was nothing 
but great threatenings thundered against the church 
and parsonage, but Colonel Ingoldsby, then Lieut. 
Governor of this Colony recommended to the adjacent 
ministers to serve the cure alternately, during the va- 
cancy, which they all did willingly at their own 
expense, and in the meantime the widow of the de- 
ceased Mr. Urquhart was suffered to live and enjoy the 
benefit of the parsonage house and glebe. 

No sooner was her Majesty pleased to remove Co- 
lonel Ingolsby from the Government whereby the same 
devolved on Colonel Gerhardus Beekman as President 
of the Council, but the very next day being the 11th of 
April 1710, several of the more violent of that sect 
took possession of the church and forcibly detained the 
same against a Justice of the peace who came pursuant 
to the laws in that case made and provided, and re- 
corded the story as in his view and committed the of- 
fenders who afterwards were set at liberty upon their 
own recognisances to appear at the next Sessions at 
which time they appeared and were by the Court fined 
so very small that though there were six offenders all 
their fines amounted to no more than Eighteen shillings, 
which was put upon them not as a punishment, but 
rather a cautionary admonition, not to attempt any 
thing of the like nature for the future, which mild deal- 
ing was so far from having any effect upon the Crimi- 
nals, that they put in a petition to the President and 
Council concerning what they had judicially done in 
their fall sessions, and the Criminals were so far encou- 
raged as to have their several fines remitted them, and 
the Justices dismissed from their further attendance as 
having acted according to law. 



MR. Mcnish's ministry. 55 

After this usage of the Justices so contrary to Law 
and after such countenance to the Criminals shown by 
the President and Council, it may easily be concluded 
the Church could not be very secure from the further 
attempts of such bitter enemies, and accordingly after 
the arrival of Mr. Poyer, the present minister, but be- 
fore his actually coming to the place, they entered into 
the parsonage house upon the possession of the Widow 
of Mr. Urquhart, who lived in it and kept the widow 
out of it by force, though she and her husband had 
been in possession of the same about six years ; (though 
we have since very great reason to believe that she 
connived at their entry, for she was soon afterwards 
readmitted as tenant to them, with one Wolsey an In- 
dependent student and approbationer, who has married 
the Daughter of the said Widow Urquhart) and after 
Mr. Poyer was inducted into the Church, the Justice 
repaired upon complaint to the parsonage house, but 
got no admittance, whereupon a second record of for- 
cible detainer was made by the Justice, on his own 
view, and warrant issued to the Sheriff to apprehend 
the offenders, and to keep them till they should be de- 
livered by due course of law, but the Sheriff who had 
been lately appointed by the President and Council, in 
the room of the former deceased, being a strong Inde- 
pendent, told the Justices his conscience would not let 
him do it, by which means the offenders have as yet 
escaped punishment, and Mr. Poyer kept out of his 
possession of the parsonage and glebe. 

In a short time after the death of Mr. Urquhart the 
Church wardens and Vestry (tho' new ones, yet all in- 
dependents) called one Mr. George McNish, a dissent- 
ing itinerant preacher, who being as much if not more 
unqualified to accept or officiate than Mr. Hubbard, the 
present Governor, Mr. Hunter, ordered Mr. Poyer to be 
inducted into the said church and its appurtenances, 
which was accordingly done by the Rev'd Mr. Sharp, 
Chaplain of the forces here on the 18th July, 1710. 



56 MR. McNISIl's MINISTRY. 

Tho' Mr. Poyer has duly officiated there for about 
the space of one year and a half, and after a very te- 
dious and expensive voyage with his family in a mer- 
chant ship, and being cast ashore with the ship above 
one hundred miles from his parish, he has not received 
one penny of his salary there since his arrival ; but 
on the contrary, they paid £16 certain (and we believe 
more that we know not of) of the money raised by the 
act to the said Mr. NcNish. 

And now because that upon so firm a foundation 
it may be expected that Mr. Poyer, the present worthy 
incumbent of this unhappy place, should by law endea- 
vour to obtain his salary, together with the parsonage 
house and lands detained from him by the Independents 
to which method his Excellency Col. Hunter has en- 
couraged him, by promising him to be at the expense 
of the suit — We humbly crave leave to offer that we 
cannot, at this juncture, think it all advisable for him 
because we are humbly of opinion that a matter of that 
consequence ought not to be in such a manner under- 
taken without the express directions of your Lordship 
and the Honourable Society, and also because such suit 
must be commenced before Judges who are professed, 
implacable enemies of the Established Church, Judges 
who wej'e lately advanced in the room of othe?'s who 
were men of character, and true friends of the Church, 
at an unlucky time, when they wej^e actually doing 
justice to the Church in this particular ; and we could 
heartily have wished that his Excellency would have 
been pleased to have favoured Mr. Foyer's petition by 
writing to those new officers to enforce them in their 
duty, and hope that such admonitions would have had 
a good influence on them ; tho' indeed justice from these 
new judges may scarcely be expected after the acting 
of three of them, who upon Mr. Foyer's complaint 
against the Church wardens for the non-payment of 
his first quarter's salary gave judgment against him, 
and ordered him to pay costs ; in which trial they de- 



MR. mcNish's ministry. 57 

nied all authority from England in spiritual matters. 
Neither is it possible to get an impartial Jury in that 
county, where all are concerned in the event, and the 
greater number of them stifl' independents. 

The reasons, may it please your Lordship that in- 
duced us to send this representation are drawn from the 
certain ruin that the loss of this cause will inevitably 
bring upon the Established Church in the whole govern- 
ment of New- York, and which cannot want its bad in- 
fluence upon the Church in all the adjacent Colonies, 
especially the Jerseys and Pennsylvania ; for if upon the 
death of Mr. Urquhart who was so firmly established 
by two acts of General Assembly, and after about six 
years quiet possession, the salary and parsonage may 
immediately be seized with impunity and enjoyed as 
they are by these Independents, why may not the rest 
of the places in the said provinces (which do all stand 
UPON THE SAME foot) Oil the death or avoidance of the 
present incumbents be in like manner invaded by them, 
(fee. 

We beg your Lordship to believe that nothing here- 
in contained is designed as the least reflection upon 
any person it being only the true plain matter of fact, 
and which we could not out of a due regard to the in- 
terests of the Church, and to your Lordship's omit the 
transmitting to your Lordship that if the sad effect we 
justly fear should happen to be the consequence of these 
things, We may clear ourselves before God and man as 
having done what was possible for us to prevent it. 

All which is humbly submitted to your Lordship's 
prudent consideration, by, may it please your Lord- 
ship, your Lordship's most dutiful, obedient sons and 
humble servants. 

Thos. Poyer, 

Rector of the parish of Jamaica and precinct. 

Wm. Vesey, 
Rector of the Parish of New- York. 

3* 



58 MR. McNish's ministry. 

Jno. Bartow, 

Rector of the parish and precinct of Westchester. 

Evan Evans, 

Rector of Philadelphia. 

John Talbot, 

Of Burlington. 

^Eneas McKensie, 

Of Staten Island. 

Jacob Henderson, 

Minister of Dover Hundred. 

John Thomas, 

Rector of Hempstead. 
New-York, \3ih Nuvem. 1711. 

Notwithstanding the declaration in the last para- 
graph of the foregoing memorial, that nothing it con- 
tained was designed to reflect in the least upon any 
person, the paper clearly contains the insinuation that 
the Governor had displaced certain officers, who were 
men of character, and decided friends of the Established 
Church, and appointed others who were its implacable 
enemies, and therefore not disposed to do Mr. Poyer 
justice. The memorial makes another thing plain, viz. 
that there were other places in the colonies, where 
property was held, or claimed by the Episcopalians, on 
the same ground precisely as the property in dispute in 
Jamaica. In regard to the other point — the relation be- 
tween Gov Hunter and the Clergy — the following 
will show that there was far from being a good under- 
standing between these parties. 



MR. McNISII S MINISTRY. 59 

Gov. Hunter to the Secretary. 

(extract.) 

New- York, Feb. 25th, 1711. 

Sir, — Col. Heathcote told me that he was privately 
informed that there had been a representation against 
me carried about to some of the clergy for subscriptions. 
I could not believe it being conscious to myself of 
nothing that I had done, left undone, or intended, with 
relation to the Church's interest, that the most consum- 
mate malice could ground a representation upon. That 
worthy gentleman was of the same opinion, but posi- 
tive that there was such a representation ; for which 
reason, he, in conjunction with Col. Morris, as members 
of the Society thought fit to write a letter to Mr. Vesey, 
and Mr. Henderson, in whose hands they understood 
this paper to be, and who were the principal contrivers 
and promoters of it, signifying that they had been made 
acquainted with the designs, and desired to know the 
meaning of it ; that if any thing were wanting for the 
Church's interest they might join with them in proper 
measures to procure it, and redress what was amiss. 
All the effect that this letter had upon these two gen- 
tlemen was a deep concern for the discovery, and some 
sharp reproaches on one another as the discoverers. 
Neither could the Rev. Mr. Sharp obtain a sight of it 
tho' he solemnly promised to join with them in repress- 
ing any thing for the Church's Interest, provided it did 
not contain unjust or groundless reflections on the 
Governor. That gentleman has given an account to 
the Lord Bishop of London, how he was used by them, 
&c. &c. 

Being to guess at the particular facts of which I 
stand accused, I can think of none that can so much 
as afford a pretence for such a representation, unless it 
be the affairs of Jamaica Church here, and that must 
only be in the opinions of such as think that all laws, 
human and divine, are to be set aside when they come 



60 MR. McNIsh's ministry. 

in competition with what they conceive to be the sec- 
ular Interest of the Church. 

Mr. Poyer having the Society's Mission, and my 
Lord Bishop of London's recommendation to that 
Church, I, upon his first apphcation, granted him in- 
duction. The Dissenters were in possession of the 
Manse house by contrivance of the Widow of Mr. 
Urquhart, the former Incumbent, whose daughter was 
married to a Dissenting minister there. I consulted 
the Chief Justice Mompesson how far I might proceed 
towards putting Mr. Poyer in possession, who gave his 
opinion in writing, that it could not be done otherwise 
than by due course of law, without a high crime and 
misdemeanour. This opinion I sent to Mr. Poyer, and 
begged him to commence a suit at my cost, but heard 
nothing from him, until some time after he came to me 
to complain that the Justices of that County had not 
done him right, when required in procuring him his 
Quarter's Stipend, upon which I sent for the Justice he 
named, ***** and in the presence of Col. 
Morris and Mr. Regnier of this place, told him that I 
would forthwith give directions that Mr. Poyer should 
commence a suit against him, and that they should not 
flatter themselves that it might be dropped through Mr. 
Poyer's present wants, for he should not want where- 
withal! to carry it on through all the lengths so just a 
cause required, and accordingly wrote to Mr. Poyer 
to that purpose. Mr. Coe, the justice mentioned, told 
me that all this was the practice (work) of one Clows, 
a most vicious wretch into whose hands Mr. Poyer 
unfortunately fell, at his first setting out, and lodg'd in 
his house, led by his pretended zeal for the Church ; but 
as he himself has since owned to Mr. Sharp, he was 
soon obliged to change his lodgings, few of his own 
Communion desiring to come near him, whilst he was 
in so bad company. 



MR. McNish's ministry. 61 

Extract of a Letter from Col. Morris to the Secretary. 

New-York, 20th Feb., 1711. 

In Col. Fletcher's time, one party of the Dissenters 
in the County where Jamaica is, resolved to build a 
Church, and in order to it got subscriptions and mate- 
rials enough to build it about three feet from the ground, 
but finding themselves unable to perfect it without the 
assistance of the rest, which could not be got by per- 
suasion, they resolved to attempt the getting an Act of 
Assembly in their favor. Col. Fletcher who was then 
Governor, and James Grahame, Esq., who was then 
Speaker of the Assembly, perceiving the Assembly in- 
clined to raise money for the building of that Church, 
and settling a maintenance for ministers, thought it a fit 
opportunity to do something in favor of the Church, 
before the zealous fit left them. Accordingly Grahame 
who had the drawing of their Bills, prescribed a method 
of Induction, and so managed it that it would not do 
well for the Dissenters, and but lamely for the Church, 
though 'twould do with the help of the Governor, and 
that was all ; but 'twas the most that could be got at 
that time, for had more been attempted the Assembly 
had seen through the artifce, the most of them being 
Dissenters, and all had been lost. By virtue of this act, 
the Church was built, and a dissenting minister called. 
* * * * ^\iQ Church and parsonage house contin- 
ued in the possession of the Dissenters till some time 
after the arrival of Mr. Urquhart, when a representa- 
tion was made to my Lord Cornbury, that the Church 
and house being built by public Act, could belong to 
none but the Church of England. My Lord upon this 
gives his warrant to dispossess the Dissenters, which 
immediately by force was done, without any procedure 
at law, and Mr. Urquhart put into possession of them. 
This short method might be of some service to the 
minister, but was very far from being of any to the 
Church, as no such unaccountable steps can ever be. 



G2 MR. McNISH S MINISTRY. 

Mr. Urquhart kept the possession during his Hfe, and 
though he gained not many converts, yet his conduct 
was so good that I don't think he lost any. After Mr. 
Urquhart's death, his widow's daughter married a dis- 
senting minister, and she put the parsonage house into 
his possession, in which it continues until now. This 
happened much about the time of Col. Hunter's arrival. 
Whether application was made to him or no I can't 
tell, but some changes in the Magistracy being made, 
and by a mistake one or two put in that were patrons 
of the Dissenters, Mr. Foyer and his friends chose to 
apply to those they were sure would refuse them, and 
not to those in place who were firm to their interest, 
and being refused, complained to the Governor, who 
immediately sent for the person and ordered him to be 
prosecuted that it might appear whether he had failed 
in his duty or not. Whether the prosecution was con- 
firmed or not I cannot tell, but I happened to be in the 
Governor's Chamber when this Judge and a Dissenting 
minister came in and this matter was talked of. He 
said that the intention of the. Legislature at that time 
was to raise a maintenance for a Dissenting minister, 
all the Assembly but one being Dissenters, and knowing 
nothing of the Church ; but that being the intention of 
the law makers was the meaning of the law, and he 
hoped the Dissenters might enjoy what was so justly 
their due, or at least not be deprived of it without due 
course of law, as they formerly had been. I told him 
the Legislature did not consist of the Assembly only, 
but of the Governor and Council joined with them, 
&c. The Governor joined in the argument, and argued 
with a great deal of force in favor of the Church, who, 
he said, he could not help thinking was in the right, 
with respect to their claims — that they might be sure 
that matters of property should be determined, by the 
ordinary course of the law, by which perhaps, they, 
being numerous might weary Mr. Foyer, being a poor 
man, but that Mr. Foyer should have his purse for the 



MR. McNISIl's MINISTRY. 63 

carrying on that suit. A day or two afterwards he told 
Mr. Poyer so himself. Some time after that wrote to 
him giving the Gentleman who carried the letter in 
charge, to tell him he still continued in the same mind. 
The Governor being at Jamaica, repeated the offer of 
bearing the whole charge of the suit, and pressed Mr. 
Poyer to undertake it. Col.'Heathcote also pressed him 
to undertake it, giving him the same assurance from the 
Governor, and Poyer promised to do it, but has been 
prevailed on to decline that method (as he says) till 
their representation reach England ; and I believe the 
poor man and his friends are weak enough to believe 
that their superiors there will enter into measures to 
displace the Governor for not Dragooning in their favor 
as his predecessor did, &c. 

The act to settle the Church is very loosely worded ; 
which, as things stood then, when it was made, could 
not be avoided — the Dissenters claiming the benefit of 
it as well as we. And the act without such resting 
(wresting ?) will admit a construction in their favour 
as well as ours. They think it was intended for them, 
and that they only have a right to it. 

There is no comparison in our numbers ; and they 
can on the death of the Incumbents call persons of their 
own persuasion in every place but the city of New- 
York. * * * * I believe at this day, the Church had 
been in a much better condition had there been no Act 
in her favour; for in the Jersies and Pennsylvania, 
where there is no act in her favour there is four times 
the number of Churchmen that there are in this pro- 
vince of New- York, and they are so most of them 
upon principle. Whereas nine parts in ten of ours 
will add no great credit to whatsoever Church they 
are of, &c. 

Mr. Vesey, who had and still makes a tool of that 
weak man Poyer, with him prevailed upon Mr. Evans 
of Philadelphia and Mr. Talbot, as I am told by some, 
to sign a representation in direct terms against the 
Governor, &c. &c. 



64 MR. McNish's ministry. 

What ground Mr. Poyer had for the apprehension 
that justice would not be done him by the Judges be- 
fore whom his cause would be tried, appears from the 
following : 

Extract of a letter from Col. Heathcote to the Secretary. 

Neic- York, Feb. II, 1711. 
Sir, — The Ships being still detained by the Ice 
gives me an opportunity of saying something more* 
concerning the affairs of the Church at Jamaica. And 
I am not a little surprised that the Church's misfortune 
there is wholly charged on account of the alterations 
of some of the officers there, and that they dare not go 
to law for that reason : which is a very great mistake 
because no officers are wanting to do Mr. Poyer justice 
thei^e either in respect of his salary or otherwise. But 
a Sheritf, that he might be safe as to his Juries, for as 
his actions will be above £20 in value, so must be 
tried by the Chief Justice, Mr. Mompesson, who never 
professed any other religion but that of the Church of 
England — and the present Sheriff, who had the charge 
of that County for above a year, is a member of the 
Church at Jamaica, and was put in that post by Col. 
Hunter at the request of Mr. Foyer's friends. And 
altho' the removal which was made among the officers 
was what I would not have advised the Gov'r to, yet 
the mistake was not so great as represented ; for some 
time after those changes were made, blamino- one of 
the gentlemen of the Council, who advised the Gover- 
nor to it, his answer was that the cry of the people 
was so loud against several of the officers then in place 
that it was absolutely necessary ; and as for those whom 

* Col. Heathcote had addressed the Secretary before, under date of 
Jan. 5th and Jan. 30th, 1711, giving the same version of Mr. Foyer's 
difficulty with the Govr. as that contained in Col. Lewis Morris's letter. 
Both were members of the Society. 



MR. ncnish's ministry. 65 

he and his friends liad recommended, the most of 'em 
were dissenters, they were on all other accounts much 
fitter for it : nor were all the old officers turned out, 
nor all in the new commission dissenters, as I had been 
told, for that several of the Church were still in place 
and many who had been in before were continued — it 
being their design to cast out ill men and not the Church. 
Now altho' I was not of his mind, yet there was truth 
in some things he offered ; for indeed many of the in- 
struments made use of to settle the Church at Jamaica, 
in its infancy, were of such warm tempers, and if re- 
port is true so indifferent in their morals, that, from the 
first beginning, I never expected it would be settled 
with much peace or reputation. For instead of taking 
an effectual care upon its first settling that none were 
employed therein but the best and soberest men, and 
those of the fairest character and best reputation among 
the people, and caressing and making use of such to 
help settle it, one Mr. Cardell,* a transient person, and 
of very indifferent reputation, was recommended, and 
made High Sheriff of that County ; and the settling 
of the Church was left in a great measure to his care 
and conduct. By these imprudent measures the lead- 
ing men were disobliged which soon chased away 
most of the good and sober people and left her only a 
very thin congregation. 

The following is the record of the Court in the suit 
of Mr. Poyer for his first quarter's stipend, to which 
there are so many allusions in the preceding papers. 
Samuel Coe and Daniel Smith were the Church 
Wardens. 

* " He seized upon the church land, divided it into lots, and leased 
them out for the benefit of his own party. This man, it seems, sustained 
a despicable character, and being afterwards apprehended for some of- 
fence, and thrown into prison, hanged himself in despair." Thomp. II. 107. 



66 MR. Mcnish's ministry. 

Queen's County. 
At a Special Court, held at Jamaica, the 27th day of 
October, in the 9th year of the reign of our Sove- 
reign Lady Anne, Anno Dom. 1710 — Present, John 
CoE, Judge ; Samuel Bayley, Richard Oldfield, 
Justices : 

Mr. Thos. Poyer per Mr. Clows complains that the 
Church Wardens do refuse to pay the one quarter's 
salary. 

Court considered of the compl't and find for the 
def'ts with costs of suit. 

The reasons of the Church Wardens against the 
compl't of Mr. Thos. Poyer. Qui tarn, (Sec. 

1st. Because we had no money. 

2dly. We had no orders from the Justices and Ves- 
try, according to an Act of Assembly to pay any. 

3dly. Because we thought Mr. Thos. Poyer not 
qualified, according to the Act of Assembly of this pro- 
vince as Minister or Incumbent of Jamaica, to demand 
the whole, or any part of the said salary. 

True Copy, Jesse Smith, Clerk. 

Mr. Poyer to the Secretary. 
(extract.) 
Jamaica L. Island, March 7, 1712. 
By the advice of Counsel I have lately served the 
Dissenter who is in possession of the Parsonage house 
and Glebe with a lease of Ejectment for continuing the 
claim but with no design of prosecuting to effect, for 
in that I shall not presume to do anything till I receive 
the express commands of the Venerable Society. 

In 1712 the Society for the Propagation of the Gos- 
pel in Foreign Parts laid the difficulties of Mr. Poyer 
before the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, and peti- 



MR. McNish's ministry. 67 

tioned " that in causes relating immediately to the 
Church an appeal may lie to your Governor and Coun- 
cil there, and to your Majesty and Privy Council here, 
without any restriction or limitation of the value or 
sum appealed for." 

Order of Council relating to appeals concerning the 
Church at New-York. 

(extract.) 

At the Court of St. James the 8th of January 1712. 
Present, — the Queen's most Excellent Majesty in 
Council. 

Upon reading this day at the Board a report from 
the Lord's Commissioners of Trade and Plantations in 
the words following, viz. (the report after reciting the 
hardships of Mr. Thos. Poyer, Clerk, agreeable to the 
representation of the Society aforesaid, that he was 
" wrongfully kept out of the parsonage house and glebe 
by the violence of some sectaries disaffected to the 
Church," concludes as follows.) This being the state of 
the case we are humbly of opinion that in cases where the 
Church is immediately concerned, as in the present case, 
your Majesty be graciously pleased to allow the Clergy 
liberty of appealing, from the Inferior Courts to the Gov- 
ernor and Council, only without limitation of any sum, 
which is humbly submitted. 

Ph : Meadows, F. Floley, 
R. MoNCKTON, J. A. Cotton. 

Whitehall, 25th Novem. 1712. 

Her Majesty in her Privy Council taking the same 
into consideration was graciously pleased to approve 
the said report, and to order, as it is hereby ordered, 
that in cases where the Church is immediately concern- 
ed, (as in this case) liberty be given to the Clergy to 
appeal from the inferior Courts to the Governor and 
Council only without limitation of any sum ; and her 



68 MR. mcnish's ministry. 

Majesty is graciously pleased to order that as well in 
this, as in other like cases liberty be given to the Clergy 
to appeal from the Governor and Council to her Majes- 
ty in Privy Council, without limitation as aforesaid &c. 
(Signed) Edward Southwell. 

Letter from the Bishop of London to Mr. Poyer. 

Sir — I do not in the least believe it was in your 
thoughts to give any uneasiness to the Church or Gov- 
ernment ; but I must think that your indiscretion hath 
been the cause of it ; of which I should have warned you 
could I have had the opportunity to do it ; and must 
now entreat you for the future to have a care of foolish 
and unwary Advisers. Pray therefore think your Gov- 
ernors to be wiser than yourself, and if you miscarry 
under that conchict, you will come off' with reputation, 
let the event prove what it will : for I must tell you 
that your application over into England hath done you 
and the rest of our Brethren no great Service, by re- 
ferring your case to people at such a distance, as nei- 
ther do, nor can know any thing of the merits of the 
cause. Be wiser therefore for the time to come, and . 
believe me that I shall be always ready to approve 
myself, 

Your most assured Friend and Brother, 

H : London. 
Fulham, May 21, 1712. 

At length an order was passed by the Society for 
the Propagation of the Gospel for defraying the ex- 
penses Mr. Poyer might incur in recovering his salary 
by due course of law; and in 1716 he commenced his 
suit, and at length recovered £16 lis. from the Church 
Wardens. This strife continued from year to year, 
and "proceeded," says Dr. Elihu Spencer, "to such 
lengths that many of the principal inhabitants were 



MR. McNISIl's MINISTRY. 69 

harassed with severe persecutions, heavy fines, and 
long imprisonments, for assuming their just rights, and 
others fled out of the Province to avoid the rage of 
Episcopal cruelty." As we have seen, the power of 
the throne itself was invoked in this controversy. 
That the Presbyterians should have held out, or that 
they ever succeeded in recovering their just rights 
against such odds, is truly matter of astonishment. 
Let the present and future generations never forget 
that eternal vigilance was the price their ancestors 
paid for the success with which their exertions were 
crowned. From such men it is an honor to have de- 
scended, and their memory should be held in grateful 
remembrance. 

Mr. Poyer to the Secretary. 

(extract.) 

Jamaica, Nov. 4, 1718. 
Hon'd Sir, — The people of this place are encour- 
aged in their obstinacy by their minister, a very design- 
ing man and who pursuades them to what he will, 
even not to obey the Lawful commands of the magis- 
trates, and they stick not to say that tho' there is a 
Law for £60 per ann. to be yearly collected for the 
minister of this Parish, and tho' Coll. Lewis Morris, 
the Chief Justice of this Province, has ordered a Writ 
of Mandamus for collecting the arrearages of the Min- 
ister's salary — Notwithstanding these orders, they say, 
if the Constables ofler to collect it upon the Warrants 
the Justices have given, pursuant to the Writ afore- 
said, they will scald them, they will stone them, they 
will go to Club Law with them, and I know not what. 

The minister who in the above letter is represented 
as exerting such an influence over his people, was the 
Rev. George McNish. He was settled, as stated al- 



70 MR. mcnish's ministry. 

ready, in 1711, although it is highly probable that he had 
preached here more or less for a year and a half be- 
fore. In 1710 Mr. McNish was Moderator of the 
Presbytery. Through his influence the Rev. Mr. 
Pumry of Newtown united with the Presbytery of 
Philadelphia; and in 1717 the Presbytery of Long 
Island was formed. Mr. McNish may therefore be 
regarded as the father of the Presbyterian Church on 
Long Island. The Presbytery of Long Island was the 
first Presbytery formed in the Province of New- York, 
and, for many years, the Presbyterian Churches in the 
city of New- York and the County of Westchester 
were subject to its jurisdiction ; he may, therefore, 
with equal propriety, be regarded as the father of Pres- 
byterianism, in its distinctive form, in the State of New 
York. In 1716 he was again Moderator of the Pres- 
bytery of Philadelphia, and consequently preached the 
Synodical sermon at the first meeting of the Synod of 
Philadelphia in 1717. His text was John xxi. 17, 
Lovest thou me. The same year (as he appears to 
have contemplated making a visit to Great Britain) he 
was deputed by the Synod, to act as its representative 
abroad, for the promotion of religion in this country. 
This visit, however, he did not make ; but the appoint- 
ment, and other important services assigned him, prove 
that he was a leading and influential minister, and 
enjoyed, in no small degree, the confidence of his 
brethren. 

Mr. McNish is said to have possessed about 1000 
acres of land at Wallkill, Orange Co. He left but one 
child, a son, named George, who married a daughter of 
Joseph Smith of Jamaica, and settled in New Jersey. 



MR. cross's ministry. 71 

In the records of the Synod for 1723 there is the fol- 
lowing entry : 

" Upon reading the list of ministers the Synod 
found to their great grief that Mr. McNish was dead.' 

In the Church Register of Newtown it is stated 
that he died March 10th, 1722.* Mrs. Elizabeth Eve- 
ritt, who died in 1840, at the advanced age of ninety- 
five, said that she had often seen his headstone in our 
burying-ground. He was consequently the third min- 
ister this church had lost by death, and the second 
buried in this town. 

Although Mr. McNish was minister of this congre- 
gation ten or eleven years, it is probable he never 
preached in the house of worship belonging to it after 
his installation, as it was not restored until several 
years after his death. Tradition says that he preached 
in a building at the eastern end of the village, which 
was the " Meeting House," undoubtedly, which the 
Presbyterians are represented to have built in the Me- 
morial which the Episcopal missionaries sent home to 
the Bishop of London. The Rev. 

ROBERT CROSS 

was the next pastor. He was a native of Ireland, in 
which country he received his education. He was 
born near Bally Kelley, anno 1G89. On the 19th of 
Sept. 1717, at the first meeting of the Synod of Phila- 
delphia, he presented his testimonials as a probationer, 

* April 1723. The town appointed three men to take possession 
of the town parsonage lot, and other land connected with it, until the 
town should recall it. 



72 MR. cross's ministry. 

lately come from Ireland, which were approved, and 
he was recommended to the Presbytery of Newcastle. 
He was ordained and settled at Newcastle, March 
17th, 1719, as the successor of the Rev. James Ander- 
son, transported by the Synod to New- York. From 
the records of the Presbytery of Newcastle, it ap- 
pears that he received the call of this congregation, 
Sept. 18th, 1723 ; and between that date and the 16th 
of Oct. he left Newcastle and came to Jamaica. He 
was minister at the time the people here recovered 
their property, and had the satisfaction of gathering 
the flock once more beneath their own vine and fig- 
tree, and of witnessing the joy of men who had become 
venerable for years, since the period of exile from their 
house of worship. 

In the year 1724, ejectment suits were brought, by 
Mr. Poyer, in the Supreme Court of New- York, 
against several tenants in possession of the parsonage 
lands. Judgment, as the Court Records show, went 
against Mr. Poyer.* At length, in the year 1727, the 
Presbyterians, after great expense, by a due course of 
law recovered their church, and had their title to the 
parsonage and glebe lands confirmed to them. 
Lewis Morris, afterwards Governor of New Jersey, 
was, at that time. Chief Justice, and presided at the 
trial. He encountered no little obloquy ; his character 
was aspersed; and, not long after the trial, he was 
suspended from the office of Chief Justice by Gov. 

* Jan. 2nd, 1725. After the failure of Mr. Poyer in several eject- 
ment suits, against the tenants of the parsonage lands, the town voted 
that the same should be delivered into the possession of Robert Cross, 
their minister. Mr. Poyer, Justice Betts, Justice Oldfield, and Richard 
Combs, entered their protest against said vote. 



I 



MR. CROSS S MINISTRY. 73 

Cosby. Judge Morris wrote to the Board of Trade, 
showing that the resentment of the Governor was 
causeless ; and he thought it necessary, on soHciting 
that his office might be restored, to pubHsh the grounds 
of his decision in the above case. 

Fulham Manuscripts. 
(extract.) 

New-York, July 14, 1727. 
My Lord : — I have been informed by Mr. Poyer 
that there is an Action commenced by the Presbyte- 
rians of Jamaica in Long Island, for the English 
Church which they pretend was built by, and was taken 
by violence from them, by my Lord Cornbury. 

I know nothing certain about their claim, but if 
they take the course of law, I can not help it ; but 
they having committed a riot in taking possession of 
the church, the Attorney General here has entered an 
information against them, and I refused them a noli 
prosequi upon their application, that their rashness 
may he attended with charge and trouble at least, if not 
punishment, which may perhaps discourage them in 
their suit, or make them willing to compromise it. 

My Lord, &c., 

W. Burnett. 

Gov. Burnett was the son of the Bishop of Sarum, 
and was the Governor of New- York from 1720 to 1728. 

Mr. Poyer to the Secretary. 

(EXTRACT.) 

Jamaica, June 16, 1731. 
Rev. Sir : — Besides the great and almost continual 
contentions that I have struggled withal amongst the 
Independents in this parish, having had several law- 
suits with them, before I could have the salary which 
the country has settled upon the minister of the Church 
of England, several other law-suits for some glebe 

4 



74 MR. cross's ministry. 

lands, which we have lost, and at last even the church 
itself of which we had the possession for 25 years, is 
taken from us by a trial at law (with what justice I 
can't pretend to say), tho' I say I have endeavoured 
as patiently as I could to bear up under all these trials, 
&c. 

Mr. Campbell to the Secretary. 

(extract.) 

New-York, Jan. 25, 1731. 
Sir : — The Presbyterians by the sly tricks and 
quirks of the common law, got the church, the parson- 
age house, and lands into their possession, and now 
they are resolved to deprive the next missionary of 
£60 currency settled as a yearly salary, by an Act of 
Assembly. The next missionary may depend upon it, 
he must either engage in a Law-suit against the Dis- 
senters, or throw up the salary above-mentioned. 

Mr. Colgan to the Secretary. 
(extract.) 

Jamaica, June lUh, 1734. 

Rev'd Sir : Upon my first coming into 

the parish, I found the Church in a declining condition. 
The Quakers and Independents have been very 
busy to subvert, and by many studied arts and rules, 
utterly to destroy it — I may say the Christian religion 
here. One of their stratagems was to sue for an edifice 
wherein divine service was performed by Ministers of 
the Church of England for near 30 years, by pretence 
that they had better right in it than the Church mem- 
bers. And this met with not a little success, for in 
sueing Mr. Poyer, my predecessor, who being defend- 
ant in the case, they, upon a very odd turn in the trial, 
cast him. I am informed that in this suit, the Counsel 
upon the part of the church always designed to put 
the matter upon some points of law which are clearly 
in the Church's favor, and accordingly in the time of 
trial offered to demur in law, but was diverted there- 



MR. cross's ministry. 75 

from by the late Chief Justice, Lewis Morris, Esq., 
(before whom the trial was,) who told them that he 
would recommend it to the Jury to find a special Ver- 
dict, and if they did not, but found generally and 
against the Church, he would then allow a new trial 
— which, after the jury had found a general verdict 
against the Church, he absolutely refused, when the 
Counsel for the Church laid claim to his promise, and 
strongly insisted upon the benefit thereof I have been 
told by some of the Counsel for the Church that the 
only seeming reason he gave for his denial was that a 
bad promise was better broke than kept, and thus an 
end was put to the controversy. 

The town having recovered their house of worship, 
Mr. Cross, the Presbyterian minister, was immediately 
put in possession of it, and his successors enjoyed the 
undisturbed possession of it as long as that venerable 
edifice remained. Still, however, the Episcopal clergy 
continued to be supported by a tax on the inhabitants, 
Presbyterians, Dutch Refoi-med, and others, from which 
they were not relieved until the Revolution of 1776. 
But to this subject I shall have occasion to refer again. 



70 MR. cross's ministry. 



CHAPTER III. 

1734—1774. 

Mr. Cross called to Philadelphia. — Dismissed. — His epitaph. — Tradi- 
tion of a revival of religion. — Mr. Heathcote. — Walter VVilmot or- 
dained. — Mrs. Wilmot's death. — Her piety. — Her diary. — Mr. Wil- 
mot's character. — Mr. Whitefield visits the place. — A revival of reli- 
gion. — Mr. Wilmot's death. — His epitaph. — David Bostwick ordain- 
ed. — Invited to Wall St. Church. — Minutes of the committee and 
the commission of Synod. — Mr. Bostwick's talents and character. — 
The historian Smith's portrait of him. — E. Spencer, D. D. — Becomes 
a chaplain in the army in French war. — Becomes minister of St. 
George's and Trenton, successively. — Inscription on his grave-stone. 
— Benoni Bradner. — Wm. Mills installed. — Number of Church mem- 
bers. — No records of the Session. — Names of Ruling Elders. — A re- 
vival of religion. — Mr. Whitefield's second visit. — Mr. Mills called to 
Philadelphia, and declines. — Death and funeral. — His sermons and 
MSS. — People refuse to raise the tax for the Episcopal minister. — 
Mr. Bloomer to the Secretary. 

In 1734, it appears that the first Presbyterian 
Church in Philadelphia had given Mr. Cross a call, as 
the matter of his removal was before the Synod to be 
there determined. The Commissioners from Jamaica 
and Philadelphia were heard at length, " and after the 
most critical examination of the affair, and the solemn 
imploring the divine assistance, the matter was put to 
vote and carried against Mr. Cross's transportation." 



MR. CROSS S MINISTRY. 77 

The church at Philadelphia was divided ; there being 
a considerable party opposed to Mr. Cross. The next 
year that part of the congregation in favor of Mr. 
Cross for their minister, petitioned the Synod to be 
erected into a new congregation. The petition was 
granted by a large majority. In 1736, a call was pre- 
sented to him from the new congregation, formed 
agreeable to the permission of Synod given the year 
before, " and his sentiments concerning it desired by 
the Synod." In answer, Mr. Cross declared that he 
thought the Synod could not determine this matter 
until his people had been duly apprized of it, and that 
as things now appeared it was " his duty to stay with 
the people of Jamaica." " After much and long debat- 
ing about this affair," the Synod at length adopted an 
overture that judgment should be deferred concerning 
it until the next meeting of Synod that the people of 
Jamaica might be apprized of the business, and have 
an opportunity to bring in their objections against Mr. 
Cross's removal. In the mean time, Mr. Cross was 
appointed to supply the new congregation in Philadel- 
phia, for two months, before the next meeting of the 
Synod ; and provision was, at the same time, made for 
supplying the people of Jamaica, during Mr. Cross's 
absence. The next year. May 27th, 1737, the subject 
of Mr. Cross's removal to Philadelphia came again be- 
fore the Synod ; the people of Jamaica presented their 
reasons why he should not be removed, and the repre- 
sentatives of the newly erected congregation of Phila- 
delphia "put in a supplication" designed to invalidate 
" the supplication from Jamaica." Mr. Cross submit- 
ted himself wholly to the judgment of the Synod. " The 



78 MR. cross's ministry. 

Synod entered upon a very serious debate about this 
whole aflair, in which considerable time being spent, 
at last, after solemn calling upon God for light and di- 
rection in such a momentous matter, it was put to the 
vote, Transport Mr. Cross from Jamaica to Philadel- 
phia or not ; and it was carried in the affirmative, ne- 
mine contradicente. The Synod appointed Messrs. 
Thompson and Anderson to prepare a suitable letter 
to the congregation of Jamaica, signifying what was 
done in said affiiir." This was ordered at the request 
of Mr. Cross. In the minutes of Synod for 1738, there 
is the following entry : " It is reported that Mr. Robert 
Cross was installed since our last, according to the 
Synod's appointment, and that the two congregations 
in Philadelphia were since united." He remained pas- 
tor of the first Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, till 
his death, which took place in August 1766. He was 
buried in the cemetery of the First Presbyterian 
Church, Philadelphia. The following is the inscrip- 
tion on his tomb : 

" Under this marble are deposited the bodies of 
Rev. Mr. Robert Cross, who was born near Bally 
Kally in Ireland anno 1689, and died anno 1766, of 
Mary, his wife, who was born in New- York anno 
1688, and died anno 1766. 

" He was removed from a pastoral charge in Long 
Island to be one of the ministers of the first Presbyte- 
rian Church, in this city, anno 1737. He excelled in 
prudence and gravity, and a general deportment, was 
esteemed for his learned acquaintance with the Holy 
Scriptures, and long accounted one of the most respec- 
table ministers in this province. 

" Reader, imitate his virtues and prepare for 
Death." 



MR. WILMOT S MINISTRY. 79 

In 1735, Mr. Cross published a sermon, preached 
before the commission of Synod at Philadelphia, which 
he affectionately dedicated to his people at Jamaica. 
In the dedication he says : " It is now (my friends) al- 
most twelve years since you called me to the delighful 
work of the ministry among you." He remained pas- 
tor of this church almost fourteen years, and it is evi- 
dent was very highly esteemed in Jamaica. There is 
a tradition that there was a revival of religion in the 
congregation during his ministry, as the fruits of which 
a considerable number joined the church. It is cer- 
tain that he was one of the most prominent and influ- 
ential ministers of the day in which he lived. 

A Rev. Mr. Heathcote is said to have succeeded 
Mr. Cross. It is probable that he merely supplied the 
pulpit for a short time, nothing has been learned re- 
specting him. The Rev. 

WALTER WILMOT 

was ordained here by the Presbytery of New- York, 
April 12th, 1738, Mr. Pemberton of New- York preach- 
ing on the occasion, from Col. i. 7. He was born at 
Southampton, on this island, in 1709. He was educated 
at Yale, where he graduated in 1735. He married a 
daughter of Jotham Townsend, of Oyster Bay, a mem- 
ber of the Society of Friends. Mrs. Wilmot was a 
woman eminent for piety, but she died at the early 
age of twenty-three years. The sermon preached at 
her funeral in Oyster Bay, where she was interred, is 
in my possession. It was preached by the Rev. Eben- 
ezer Prime, of Huntington, from Ezek. xxiv. 16. I have 
also a copy of the Journal kept by Mrs. Wilmot, which 



80 MR. WILMOT S MINISTRY. 

was published by her husband, after her death. In the 
dedication " to Mr. Jotham Townsend, father of the 
deceased," Mr. Wilmot says : " In the latter part of her 
life, she scarcely seemed to be an inhabitant of this 
world ; for as she had frequent intimations of her de- 
parture, so she kept death in view, and made it her 
grand concern to be found ready. Her time, her powers, 
her soul, her body, in a word her all, for some months 
before she left us, seemed devoted to the service and 
glory of her dear Redeemer." " 'Tis with pleasure I can 
observe your daughter was generally beloved and hon- 
oured whilst she lived amongst us. I believe I shall not 
easily forget you, nor your family, out of which I have 
had so desirable a companion. Her stay with me in- 
deed was short ; but it was pleasant and very agreeable : 
I may say without vanity, we lived together in perfect 
harmony, and knew no other strife betwixt us, but that 
of making each other happy : in this we strove to excel ; 
and in this no doubt she had the pre-eminence. Let us 
join to remember the dear infant, the little image of her- 
self, she has left behind her; 'tis the only remaining 
part of an obedient daughter and tender wife." The 
affecting little volume closes with this passage from her 
private papers ; " O how many fears attend me ! O that 
I knew how it must be with my soul when I depart 
this life ! I shall within a few days pass through a 
scene of darkness ; and I know not but it will be the 
dark valley of the shadow of death ; and then except 
the Lord support me I shall fall. O my soul, meditate 
on the season. Make haste and not delay to be found 
crying for a sealed pardon from the great Judge of 
Heaven ; that when death approaches, thou mayest be 



MR. wilmot's ministry. 81 

found ready to depart : O Lord, be my helper. Grant 
that whether I hve or die, I may be the Lord's. Be 
with me this night for the sake of Christ, Amen. This 
day sweet advice from a near friend, to trust only in 
God." On the above her husband remarks : " This per- 
haps was the last passage she ever wrote. She lived 
without any remarkable alteration till the Friday follow- 
ing ; was taken amiss that evening, was soon speechless, 
and in a great measure senseless. On Saturday about 
three of the clock fell asleep ('tis hopeful) in the Lord 
Jesus Christ. On the next Monday following, she was 
interred at Oyster Bay, the place of her nativity; and 
has left me to bewail an unspeakable loss. When I 
returned home and looked amongst her papers, the 
following lines to me (which must have been written 
near two months before her death) lay first in sight, 
and came first to hand : 

' Dear partner of my earthly love, 
I quickly from you shall remove; 
My soul will take her hasty flight, 
To everlasting shades of night, 
Or to the endless realms of light.' " 

Mr. Wilmot was evidently a man distinguished for 
spirituality of mind and ardor of piety ; and although 
he died young it cannot be doubted that his ministry 
here was crowned with the happiest results ; but what 
those results actually were, from the paucity of our 
records and the failure of tradition, cannot now cer- 
tainly be known. In 1740 it is evident that Mr. White- 
field visited this place, and that his labors, as elsewhere, 
were greatly blessed to the awakening of numbers to 



82 MR. wilmot's ministry. 

attend to the salvation of their souls. The effect of 
his labors may be judged of by the following extracts 
from letters of Mr. Colgan, the Episcopal missionary 
here, at that time, to the Secretary of the Society for 
the Propagation of Religion in Foreign Parts : 

Jamaica, Nov. 22d, 1740. 
Some enthusiastical itinerant teachers have of late 
been preaching upon this Island, the notorious Mr. 
Whitefield being at the head of them, and among other 
pernicious tenets have broached such false and erro- 
neous opinions concerning the doctrine of Regeneration 
as tend to the destruction of true religion and of a 
holy and virtuous life ; and therefore I take this oppor- 
tunity to beg that the Society would be pleased to be- 
stow upon the people of this Parish a few of Dr. 
Waterland's pieces on that subject, and of his Lord- 
ship, the Bishop of London's Pastoral Letters upon luke- 
warmness and enthusiasm. 

The opinions of Mr Whitefield on the doctrine of 
regeneration are perfectly well known ; he hardly 
preached a sermon without insisting upon it ; "and one, 
and perhaps the best of his discourses (says the Rev. 
Joseph Smith who published a discourse on his charac- 
ter and preaching) was ex professo upon this subject." 

It was in 1739 that Mr. Whitefield sailed the second 
time, for America. He arrived in Philadelphia in 
November of that year, and from thence was invited 
to New- York, where he preached in the open air in the 
day-time, and in the Rev. Mr. Pemberton's Church in 
the evening, for above a week. It was at this time, 
probably, that he visited Jamaica ; and wherever he 
preached thousands were gathered from various parts. 
" It was no less pleasing than strange to him to see 



MR. wilmot's ministry. 83 

such gatherings in a foreign land ; ministers and peo- 
ple shedding tears ; sinners struck with awe ; and se- 
rious persons who had been much run down and 
despised, filled with joy."* The Messrs. Tennents, Blair, 
Rowland, and Mr. Freelinghausen, a Dutch minister, 
received him gladly ; and these devoted men, or some 
of them, were doubtless the " enthusiastical itinerant 
teachers," referred to in Mr. Colgan's epistle, associated 
with Mr. Whitefield. It is gratifying to contemplate 
Mr. Wilmot as a man of kindred spirit with these emi- 
nently holy and useful men. A work of grace, under 
their combined labors, evidently took place here, and 
in the surrounding region, which continued for a con- 
siderable period, as appears from the following : 

Mr. Colgan to the Secretary. 
(extract.) 

Jamaica, March 23d, 1743. 
Rev'd Sir. — Our Church here is in a flourishing 
condition ; her being depressed of late by those clouds 
of error and enthusiasm, which hung so heavily about 
her, has in effect tended to her greater illustration and 
glory. If the Society would be pleased to order me 
some small tracts, such as the Trial of Mr. Whitefield's 
Spirit, an Englishman directed in the choice of his 
Religion, Bishop Stillingfleet's Unreasonableness of Sep- 
aration, &c. [In a letter dated Dec. 15th 1741, from Mr. 
C. to the Secretary this sentence occurs : " Enthusiasm 
has of late been very predominant amongst us" — lan- 
guage which refers to a state of things which we have 
no difficulty in understanding.] 

Mr. Wilmot was of a delicate constitution, and 
soon followed his wife to the grave. She died in Feb- 

* Gillie's Memoirs of Whitefield, chap. v. 



84 MR. wilmot's ministry. 

ruary, and he died on the 6th of the following August, 
1744. The following entry is found in the records 
of the church at Newtown : " The Rev. Mr. Walter 
Wilmot was taken sick the 15th day of July 1744, in 
the evening. Departed this life the 6th day of August 
following, about two of the clock in the afternoon, and 
was interred the 7th inst., and has left his honored 
mother and people to bewail an unspeakable loss." 

Mr. Wilmot was greatly beloved ])y his people, and 
his death was sincerely regretted. Many children re- 
ceived the name of Walter, or Walter Wilmot, in 
memory of him. He was the fourth minister who died 
pastor of this church, and the third buried in this town. 
His grave-stone still stands in the burying-ground be- 
longing to the congregation — the inscription on which 
is as follows : 

Here lyes 
the Rev. Walter Wilmot, 
Dec^d Aug. y 6th, 1744. 

jEtatis 35. 

No more from sacred desk I preach, 
You hear my voice no more, 
Yet, from the dead, my dust shall teach 
The same I taught before. 

Be ready for this dark abode, 
That when our bodies rise, 
We meet with joy the Son of God, 
Descending from the skies. 



MR. bostwick's ministry. 85 

The Rev. 

DAVID BOSTWICK 

was ordained here Oct. 9th, 1745, on which occasion 
President Burr preached from 2 Tim. ii. 15 : Study 
to show thyself approved of God. The sermon was 
pubHshed, and a copy of it is in my possession. The 
Rev. Mr. Pemberton, then minister of New- York, de- 
Uvered the charges, or " an exhortation," as it was 
called, to minister and people. 

Mr. Bostwick was a native of New Milford, Ct., 
and is said to have been of Scotch descent. He was 
educated at New Haven, and after instructing an acad- 
emy at Newark, N. J., for a short time, he became 
minister here, at the age of 24. " He continued here ten 
years, enjoying the respect and affection not only of 
his own people, but also of his brethren in the min- 
istry." 

In 1754 he was appointed, by the Synod of New- 
York, with others, to visit the destitute parts of Vir- 
ginia and North Carolina to perform missionary labor. 
His pulpit was ordered to be supplied, during his ab- 
sence, by Messrs. Gumming, Horton, Dagget, and Park. 

At a general town meeting, held on the 21st of 
April, 1753, the town by a unanimous vote, three per- 
sons only dissenting, viz., Samuel Clowes, Jr., Robert 
Denton, and Joseph Oldfield, gave the meadow and up- 
land which in 1676 had been " set apart for the use of 
a minister of the Presbyterian denomination," to the 
elders and deacons of that congregation, to be sold, to 
have and to hold the money arising from the sale — the 
interest to be devoted to the support of a Presbyterian 



86 MR. bostwick's ministry. 

minister foi'cver. Daniel Smith, Elias Baylis, Increase 
Carpenter, and Nehemiah Smith, are the persons nam- 
ed as the elders and deacons at that time. 

In 1755, Mr. Bostwick was invited to take the pas- 
toral charge of the First Presbyterian Church, in the 
city of New- York. The Presbytery of New- York 
referred the call to the Synod, which body appointed 
Messrs. Gilbert Tennent, Prime, William Tennent, 
Burr, Treat, Davenport, John Smith of Rye, McCrea, 
Beatty, Hunter, Allen, Read, Buel, Sackett, Brown, 
Lewis, and Rogers, to be their committee, to meet at 
Jamaica on the 29th of Oct., 1755, " to determine that 
affair, and any other matters relative to it, that may 
come before them." 

At the meeting of Synod in 1756, "the committee 
appointed to meet at Jamaica on the affair of Mr. 
Bostwick's removal, laid the minutes of their proceed- 
ings before the Synod, which were approved, and are 
as follows : 

" At a meeting of the committee of the Synod of 
New- York at Jamaica, October 29, 1755, according to 
appointment ; Present, Messrs. President Burr, Samuel 
Sacket, Samuel Buel, Israel Read, James Brown, Tim- 
othy Allen. 

" Post jireces, sederunt qui supra. 

" The committee was opened by a sermon preached 
by Mr. Buel, from Job xiv. (xv. ?) 8. 

" Mr. Burr chosen moderator, Mr. Allen, clerk. 

" The affair of Mr. Bostwick's removal came under 
consideration. The committee having heard all the 
several parties concerned in that affair had to offer, 
after much deliberation, adjourned the further conside- 



MR. bostwick's ministry. 87 

ration of it till to-morrow, half an hour past eight in the 
morning, to which time the committee is adjourned. 
Concluded with prayer. 

" 30^/i day. The committee met according to ad- 
journment. Ubi post preces sederunt. 

" The committee proceeded to a long deliberation 
on the aftair of Mr. Bostwick's removal. 

'' Endein die, {same day,) seven of the clock, P. M. 

" Messrs. Gilbert Tennent, William Tennent, James 
McCrea, Charles Beatty, Andrew Hunter, and John 
Rogers, came, being prevented attending the preceding 
sederunts (sessions) by the tempestuousness of the 
weather. 

" The affair of Mr. Bostwick's removal from Jamaica 
to New- York, reconsidered ; and after much consulta- 
tion, concluded to defer the further consideration of it 
till to-morrow morning, at eight of the clock ; to which 
time the committee is adjourned. Concluded with 
prayer. 

" 31s< day. The committee met according to adjourn- 
ment. Ubi post preces sederunt. 

" The affair of Mr. Bostwick's removal, &c., reas- 
sumed. 

" The committee not having sufficient light to come 
to a full determination of that affair at this time, con- 
clude that it be referred to the standing commission of 
the Synod of New- York, to be convened by the mod- 
erator, at Princeton, on the second Wednesday of April 



88 ME. bostwick's ministry. 

next, at eleven of the clock, A. M. ; and that Mr. Bost- 
wick be appointed to supply at New- York, the whole 
months of December and January, and the two first 
Sabbaths of February next ; and that the Presbytery of 
New- York provide a constant supply for Jamaica, 
during Mr. Bostwick's absence. And this committee 
recommends it to the people of Jamaica, to make the 
necessary winter provisions for Mr. Bostwick's family 
as usual. Concluded with prayer." 

" The commission of the Synod made report to the 
Synod, that they met on the affair of Mr. Bostwick's 
removal, referred unto them by the committee. The 
minutes of their proceedings are as follows : 

" The commission of the Synod of New- York, reg- 
ularly called, met at 

" Princeton, April \Ath, 1756. 

"Present: Messrs. the Moderator, Aaron Burr, John 
Pierson, William Tennent, Richard Treat, James Dav- 
enport, John Rogers, Azariah Horton. 

" Absent : Messrs. Elihu Spencer, David Bostwick, 
Gilbert Tennent, Charles Tennent, Ebenezer Prime, 
James Brown, Samuel Finley. 

" Coi^respondents : Messrs. Timothy Jones, Timothy 
Allen, Charles McKnight, John Brainerd, Charles Beat- 
ty, David Lawrence, Caleb Smith. 

" Post preces, sederunt. 

'' Mr. Caleb Smith was chosen clerk. 

" The commission was opened by a sermon, preach- 
ed by the moderator, from John xviii. 36. 

" The Rev. Mr. Johannes Light, a minister of the 
Reformed Dutch Church, was desired to sit as a cor- 
respondent. 



MR. bostwick's ministry. 89 

" The affair of Mr. Bostwick's removal from Jamaica 
to New- York, was brought before the commission, by 
a letter from the elders and deacons of the Presbyterian 
congregation in New- York, representing their con- 
tinued unanimity for Mr. Bostwick, and that the rea- 
sons for his removal to them are very much strength- 
ened and increased by his labors among them the last 
winter, which appeared more fully by their commis- 
sioners, who were sent for that purpose. The mode- 
rator also reported, that he had accidentally left at 
home, a letter he had received from Mr. Bostwick, 
representing his low state of health, and fear that he 
could not attend the commission, and in case he did 
not, that he would acquiesce in their judgment, about 
his removal to New- York. 

" The commission having read the papers contain- 
ing a representation of the state of the Presbyterian 
congregation at Jamaica, and their reasons against Mr. 
Bostwick's removal : after much deliberate considera- 
tion of the important affair, and earnest prayer to God 
for direction in it, adjourned the further consideration 
of it till to-morrow morning, at eight of the clock. 
Concluded with prayer. 

" 15th day. At eight of the clock, A. M., the com- 
mission met. Post preces, sederunt qui supra. 

" The Rev. Mr. David Cowel was desired to sit as a 
correspondent. 

" The affair of Mr. Bostwick's removal, reassumed. 
The commission having weighed the reasons for and 
against it with deep concern, and great deliberation, 
considering the peculiar circumstances and great im- 



90 MR. bostwick's ministry. 

portance of the New- York congregation, how long they 
have been destitute ; how many fruitless attempts have 
been made to resettle the Gospel among them ; the lit- 
tle hopes of their being so well united in any other per- 
son ; and especially the desirable prospect that appears 
of Mr. Bostwick's great usefulness in that place ; can- 
not but judge it to be his duty to remove ; and his 
pastoral relation to the church and congregation at 
Jamaica is dissolved for that purpose. But as the com- 
mission have a tender concern for the congregation of 
Jamaica, a great sense of their importance, and how 
their case calls for special regard, they desire the mod- 
erator, in his journey to Boston, to look out for a can- 
didate to be sent among them, and appoint the said 
moderator to supply them one Sabbath on his return ; 
and Messrs. Simon Horton, Ebenezer Prime, and Ben- 
jamin Talmage, are appointed to supply at Jamaica the 
three Sabbaths immediately succeeding Mr. Bostwick's 
departure, of which Mr. Bostwick is appointed to give 
them notice. And the Presbyteries of New- York and 
Suffolk are ordered to take special care that they be 
constantly supplied till next Synod. The commission 
also considering that the congregation of Jamaica will 
necessarily be put to charge in obtaining a re-settle- 
ment of the Gospel ministry, do earnestly recommend 
to the Presbyterian Church in New- York, to exercise 
a Christian generosity toward the people of Jamaica, 
that they may be better enabled to settle another min- 
ister." 

This account of Mr. Bostwick's removal is instruc- 
tive as it illustrates the importance which was at- 
tached, by the fathers of the Presbyterian Church, to 



ME. bostwick's ministry. 91 

the pastoral relation. The same caution was evinced 
when Mr. Cross was removed to Philadelphia. 

Mr. Bostwick remained pastor of the old Wall- 
street Church for about seven years. He died after a 
few days' illness Nov. 12th, 1763, in the 44th year of 
his age.* Smith, in his History of New- York (see Ap- 
pendix, p. 307), gives this portrait of Mr. Bostwick : 
" He is a gentleman of a mild, catholic disposition ; and 
being a man of piety, prudence, and zeal, confines him- 
self entirely to the proper business of his function. In 
the art of preaching he is one of the most distinguished 
clergymen in these parts. His discourses are methodi- 
cal, sound, and pathetick, in sentiment and in point of 
diction singularly ornamented. He delivers himself 
without notes, and yet with great ease and fluency of 
expression ; and performs every part of divine worship 
with a striking solemnity." 

A treatise from his pen, entitled, " A Fair and Ra- 
tional Vindication of the Right of Infants to the Ordi- 
nance of Baptism" was published in 1764, and reprint- 
ed in London, the following year. This work was re- 
published in New- York, in 1837, by Mr. Robert Car- 
ter. It has a brief memoir of the author prefixed, from 
which the following passages are taken : 

" He was remarkably supported under his last ill- 
ness, and died in the faith and hope of the Gospel. 

"As a preacher Mr. Bostwick was uncommonly 



• In the cemetery at Newark, N. J., there is a monument to his 
widow with this epitaph : 

" In memory of Mrs. Mary Bostwick, relict of the Rev. David Bost- 
wick, late pastor of the Presbyterian Church in New- York, who de- 
parted this life 22 Sep. 1778, aged 57 years." 



92 MR. bostwick's ministry, 

popular. His gifts and qualifications for the pulpit 
were of a high order. His appearance and deport- 
ment were peculiarly venerable ; possessing a clear un- 
derstanding, a warm heart, a quick apprehension, 
a lively imagination, a solid judgment, and a strong 
voice ; he spoke in a distinct, deliberate, and impres- 
sive manner, and with a commanding eloquence. 

" He dealt faithfully with his hearers — declaring 
to them the whole counsel of God — showing them their 
danger and their remedy; speaking with the solemnity 
becoming the importance of the subject, and in lan- 
guage pure and elegant, yet plain and affectionate : 
never, below the dignity of the pulpit, nor above the 
capacity of any in his auditory." 

Mr. Bostwick was author of a memoir of Pres. 
Davies, prefixed to his sermon on the death of 
George II. 

After his removal from Jamaica, the Rev. Simon 
Horton, of Newtown, was called to be the minister of 
the place, as appears from the following passage in Dr. 
Berrian's late history of Trinity Church, New- 
York : 

" In the beginning of the year 1756, the Rev. Mr. 
Barclay acquainted the Society that the Church had 
suffered a gi'eat loss, by the death of Mr. Colgan, for- 
merly a catechist in this parish, but, for many years, a 
laborious and worthy minister at Jamaica Town in 
L. I. ; and that the churches under his care were very 
apprehensive of great difficulties in obtaining a Clergy- 
man of the Church of England to succeed him, because 
the dissenters were a majority in the vestry of that 
parish. It too soon appeared that their apprehensions 
were not without good reason, for the dissenters pre- 



MR. spencer's ministry, 93 

vailed by their majority in the vestry to present one 
Simon Horton, a dissenting teacher, to Sir Charles 
Hardy, the Governor, for induction into the Parish, but 
the Governor would not admit him into that cure. 
After more than six months his Excellency was pleased 
to collate to the cure of the Church, the Rev. Samuel 
Seabury, Jr." P. 118. 

Mr. Bostwick was succeeded, in this place, by 
the Rev. 

ELIHU SPENCER, D. D. 

He was a native of East Haddam, Connecticut, 
born Feb. 12th, 1721. He graduated at Yale College 
in 1746, and in the latter part of his life had the degree 
of D. D. conferred on him by the University of Penn- 
sylvania. He was ordained to the work of the minis- 
try in Boston, Sept. 1748, and succeeded Mr. Dicken- 
son as pastor of the First Church at Elizabethtown, 
where he was installed, Feb. 7th, 1750. He left Eliza- 
bethtown in 1756. 

He labored here for two years or more, certainly 
from May 22d 1758 to May 1760 ; but it is not certain 
that he was installed pastor. For several years after 
leaving Jamaica, he was engaged as a chaplain in the 
army, during the French war. Tradition says that the 
congregation consented to part with him, thinking that 
they could intrust their children with him. 

The following is found in the printed minutes of the 
Synod of New- York, p. 283 : " In case Mr. Spencer shall 
go out as chaplain with the New- York forces, the 
Synod appoints Mr. Simon Horton, to supply Jamaica 



94 . MR. SPENCER S MINISTRY. 

congregation three Sabbaths, and Mr. John Smith two 
Sabbaths, and that the Presbytery of Suffolk supply 
seven-eights of the remaining time of his absence." 
After Dr. Rodgers' removal from St. George's, Dela- 
ware, to the city of New- York, he succeeded him in 
that pastoral charge, where he remained five years. 
He removed to Trenton, N. J., in 1770, and continued 
to be the pastor of that church until Dec. 1784, when 
he died. He is said to have been a man of prompt, 
popular, excellent talents ; of highly respectable literary 
character ; one of the most ready extempore preachers 
of his day, and eminent for his zeal and usefulness. 
At the time he was minister of Jamaica, he published a 
letter to Pres. Stiles on the dissenting interests in the 
Middle States ; he was likewise author of a pamphlet 
on the origin and growth of Episcopacy. Gen. Joseph 
Spencer of the Revolution was his brother.* 

The following is the inscription on his gravestone : 
" Beneath this stone lies the body of the Rev. Elihu 
Spencer, D. D., pastor of the Presbyterian Church of 
Trenton and one of the Trustees of the College of New 
Jersey : who departed this life on the 27th of Decem- 
ber, 1784, in the 64th year of his age. Possessed of 
fine genius, of great vivacity, of eminent, active piety, 
his merits as a minister and a man stand above the reach 
of flattery. Having long edified the Church by his 
talents and example, and finished his course with joy, 

* " A better testimony to the piety of the Rev. Dr. Spencer cannot 
be offered than by stating that he was particularly recommended to the 
commissioners at Boston, by David Brainerd, who was one of the best 
of men, as a suitable character for the missionary service among the 
aborigines." Alden's Epitaphs, p. 194. 



MR. bradner's ministry. 95 

he fell asleep full of faith, and waiting for the hope of 
all saints." The Rev. 

BENONI BRADNER. 

preached here after Dr. Spencer from, 1760 to 1761. 
He was son of the Rev. John Bradner, the first min- 
ister of Goshen, in this State, and was born in 1734. 
He graduated at Nassau Hall in 1755. It is not 
certain whether he was installed as pastor, or preached 
here merely as a candidate : tradition says that he was 
installed. He married, in Jamaica, Miss Rebecca Brid- 
get. He is said to have been troubled with shortness 
of breath, and to have been of a consumptive habit. 
He left about June 22, 1761, on account of a division 
in the congregation, although the greater part are said 
to have hked him. He is never mentioned as a mem- 
ber of Synod ; but his name appears as a correspond- 
ing member, in ] 764. Mr. Bradner became minister 
of Bloominggrove Church, in Orange Co., in June 1786. 
In 1802, he ceased from the labors of the pulpit. He 
died after a long and distressing illness, Jan. 29th, 1804, 
in the seventy-first year of his age. The Rev. 

WILLIAM MILLS, 

a native of Smithtown, on this Island, was the next 
pastor. His father's name was Isaac, who with two 
other brothers settled at Mills' Pond. He was born 
March 13th, 1739, was a graduate of Nassau Hall in 
1756, studied theology at Neshaminy, was licensed by 
the Presbytery of N. Brunswick in March, 1760, was 



96 MR. MILLs's MINISTRY. 

ordained at Flemington, N. J., April 21st, 1762, and 
was installed here in 1762, having begun to preach 
here, as a candidate, on the first Sabbath in July, 1761. 
At the time of his settlement here, there were but 
twelve persons, members in full communion of the 
church. There were no records to be found belonging 
to the church. In a book of minutes which he began 
to keep Aug. 30th, 1767, he says, " When I settled in 
this place, which was in the year 1762, I found no re- 
cords belonging to the church, no, not so much as a 
Register of the names of such as were in full commun- 
ion. And as the congregation were unacquainted with 
the business of church sessions, the business of the 
church which we had to transact was done without 
strictly attending to the forms of Presbyterianism. 
Another reason why no minutes have been kept of our 
proceedings, is, that we have been happy enough to 
have little or none of that business to do which church 
sessions are very generally employed about, in their 
meetings. There have, it is true, been a very consider- 
able number added to the church in this time, who have 
ordinarily been examined by the church sessions, or 
in their presence, whose names are preserved in a Re- 
gister kept for that purpose. But notwithstanding all 
this, I wish, I heartily wish, that minutes had been 
kept both before, and since my settlement in this 
church, of its proceedings." The names of ruling 
elders given are Joseph Skidmore, Esq., Daniel Baylis, 
Elias Baylis, and Increase Carpenter. At the meeting 
of the session, June 21, 1770, Nicholas Smith, and 
Samuel Denton, are stated to be present as Elders. 



MR. MILLs's MINISTRY. 97 

Mr. Mills appears to have been highly esteemed by 
his people as an exemplary Christian, and faithful min- 
ister of the Gospel. During his ministry there occur- 
red a revival of religion, probably in 1764, by which a 
considerable number were added to the Church. The 
last of the fruits of that gracious work, Mrs. Elizabeth 
Everitt, who was born May 4, 1745, left this world in 
1840, at the advanced age of 95, having been a com- 
municant nearly 75 years. It was during the summer 
of 1764, that Mr. Whitefield visited Jamaica, the 
second time, when such crowds flocked to hear him 
that he preached in the open air, standing, it is said, 
under an apple tree, not far from the spot on which 
Union Hall Academy is now located. In a letter writ- 
ten at this time, he says ; " At present my health is 
better than usual, and as yet I have felt no inconveni- 
ence from the summer's heat. I have preached twice 
lately in the fields, and we sat under the blessed Re- 
deemer's shadow with great delight. My late excur- 
sions upon Long Island, I trust, have been blessed. It 
would surprise you to see above one hundred carriages 
at every sermon in the new world." There are still 
remaining a few who remember the interest and grati- 
tude with which they often heard their pious parents 
refer to this season of heavenly refreshing. 

The following is an extract of a letter from Mr. 
Seabuf y to the Secretary of the Society for the Propa- 
gation of Religion in Foreign Parts, referring to Mr. 
Whitefield's visit to Jamaica : 

Jamaica, October Qth, 1764. 
Rev'd Sir, — Since my last letter to the Honored 
Society we have had a long visit from Mr. Whitefield 
5 



98 MR. MILLs's MINISTRY. 

in this Colony, where he has preached frequently, espe- 
cially in the city of New- York, and in this Island ; and 
I am sorry to say I think he has had more influence 
than formerly, and 1 fear has done a great deal of mis- 
chief His tenets and method of preaching have been 
adopted by many of the Dissenting Teachers, and this 
town in particular has a continual, I had almost said, a 
daily succession of Strolling Preachers and Exhorters, 
&c. 

In 1767, Mr. Mills received an urgent call to the 
second Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, but the 
Presbytery decided against it. An appeal was taken 
by the commissioners to the Synod, which was an- 
swered by a long remonstrance from the congregation 
of Jamaica, an address from the Presbytery, and a let- 
ter from the Rev. Ebenezer Prime, of Huntington. 
Mr. Mills also declared that he esteemed it his duty to 
remain in Jamaica. After a full hearing of the case, 
the Synod confirmed the judgment of the Presbytery, 
that it would not be for the edification of the Church 
to remove him. 

This excellent minister died in the 36th year of his 
age. He had repaired to New- York for medical aid, 
being affected with a chronic disease, and there he 
ended his days, March 18th, 1774. His remains were 
brought to Jamaica, and interred under the communion 
table in the old Stone Church. The following notice 
of his death appeared in Rivington's Gazette for March 
24th, 1774. 

On Friday last, died in this city, in the 36th year of 
his age, the Rev. William Mills, minister of the Pres- 
byterian Church at Jamaica, L. I. His amiable dispo- 
sition, his peaceful and prudent conduct, his unaflected 



MR, MILLs's MINISTRY. 99 

piety, and rational devotion, remarkably endeared him 
to those acquainted with him ; and as his life was a 
bright example of the Christian virtues he inculcated 
on others, so in the prospect of dissolution, he enjoyed 
that calm serenity of soul, and that good hope which 
are the peculiar blessings of the righteous. " Mark the 
perfect man and behold the upright, for the end of that 
man is peace." 

His remains were interred on Monday last at Ja- 
maica ; a large number of the most respectable inhabi- 
tants of that town and the country adjacent, attended 
at the funeral, when a sermon, well adapted to the 
occasion, was preached by the Rev. Dr. Rodgers, from 
Matt. XXV. 21. 

He left six children, of whom several emigrated to 
the West. William settled at Cincinnati, and Isaac at 
Elizabethtown, Ohio, which town he named after 
Elizabethtown, N. J., to which place Mrs. Mills went 
to reside after her husband's decease. Before his death, 
Mr. Mills requested his sermons, of which he is said to 
have had a great number, and his writings to be de- 
stroyed ; but at the solicitation of the Rev. Mr. Wood- 
hull, of Newtown, who was his nephew, they were 
given to him. Mr. Woodhull was a son of his sister, 
Joanna, who married Nathan Woodhull, of Setauket. 
A considerable amount of property appears to have 
been left by Mr, Mills, as three improved farms, be- 
longing to his estate, were advertised, in the aforesaid 
Gazette, to be sold shortly after his death. 

During Mr. Mills's ministry the people again refused 

to raise by tax the £60 which were appropriated to the 

support of an Episcopal missionary. This tax, as was 

stated at the close of a former chapter, was laid upon 

LctC. 



100 MR. MILLs's MINISTRY. 

the people of all denominations. In 1769 the people 
of Jamaica refused to pay the stipend to the Episcopal 
Minister, and at length made an appeal to the Court of 
Chancery, to be relieved from the burden. Mr. Bloomer 
the missionary, who addressed the Secretary in the 
following, was inducted, on the 23d of May 1769. 

M7\ Bloomer to the Seci'etary. 

(extract.) 

Jamaica, Feb. 15th 1770. 
Rev. Sir, — I am sorry to acquaint the Society that 
my happiness is much obstructed on account of a 
troublesome lawsuit I am under the obligation of com- 
mencing against the Parish for a salary of £60 a year 
allowed by an act of the Province to the minister who 
is legally inducted by the Governor. The law for rais- 
ing this sum obliges the people of the Parish, consisting 
of all denominations, annually to elect ten Vestrymen 
and two Church Wardens who are to call, within one 
year after a vacancy, a sufficient Protestant Minister 
of the Gospel, whom they are to present to the Gover- 
nor, or Commander in Chief, for induction. And as 
dissenters compose a great majority of the Parish, they 
are careful to admit none into these offices but such as 
are opposed to calling and presenting a minister of the 
Church of England. And in order to evade paying 
the salary (which being raised by tax, they complain of 
as a burden) and at the same time comply with the law, 
they some years ago called, and presented to the Gov- 
ernor, a minister of the Presbyterian persuasion, but 
he was refused induction : — and as the act only specifies 
that he who is called shall be a sufficient Protestant 
Minister of the Gospel, without confining them to any 
particular denomination, they imagine that the law has 
been complied with on their parts, and absolutely refuse 
paying me any money raised by virtue of that act, not- 



MR. MILLs's MINISTRY. 101 

withstanding my being inducted by authority from his 
Excellency, the Governor, as I am destitute of a call 
from them, who being dissenters, and chiefly Presby- 
terians, are averse to the supporting of the Church of 
England. 

The Court decreed in favor of Mr. Bloomer, and 
it does not appear that the people obtained any redress 
until the Revolution relieved them. That event put 
an end to the controversy which had continued in this 
place, between the Presbyterians and Episcopalians, 
for three quarters of a century. 



102 MR Burnet's ministry. 



CHAPTER IV. 

1774—1841. 

Matthias Burnet ordained. — Marries in Jamaica.. — The Revolution. — 
Presbyterian ministers support the Continental Congress. — Mr. Burnet 
has influence with the loyalists. — Saves the Pres. church from destruc- 
tion. — Highlanders attend his preaching. — The Scotch woman and her 
bottle of water. — Mr. Onderdonk's Revolutionary Incidents. — Elias 
Baylis arrested. — Sent to the Provost. — Sings in prison. — His death. 
— Other Whigs seized. — Whigs return at the close of the war. — Mr. 
Burnet leaves, and settles at Norwalk. — Death. — George Faitoute in- 
stalled. — One of the original Trustees of U. H. Academy. — The old 
stone church taken down, and a new one built. — Mr. Faitoute's 
death. — H. R. Weed, D. D., ordained. — Dismissed. — Mr. Nettleton. — 
Great Revival. — Interesting narrative. — E. W. Crane installed. — His 
history and character. — His useful ministry. — Revivals of religion. — 
His death. 

Thf Rev. 

MATTHIAS BURNET, D. D., 

received the call of this church in the fall of 1774, and 
was ordained by the Presbytery of New- York, and in- 
stalled as pastor in April, 1775. He was born at Bottle 
Hill, N. J., Jan. 24th, 1749, and graduated at Princeton 
in 1769. His ^first wife was Miss Ann Combs of 
Jamaica, an Episcopalian ; he afterwards married a 
daughter of Rev. Mr. Roe, of Woodbridge, N. J., who 



MR. Burnet's ministry. 103 

survived him, and died but two or three years since, in 
the city of New- York. 

Mr. Burnet came here just at the breaking out of 
the Revolutionary war, and continued here till its close. 
It must be owned that he was one of the very few, if 
not the only one of the Presbyterian Clergy, who did 
not openly espouse the cause of civil liberty. Wither- 
spoon, Rodgers, Duffield, and the whole Synod, in its 
official capacity, without a dissenting voice, threw their 
influence on the side of the Colonies, against the usurp- 
ations of the government. In a pastoral letter adopted 
May 22d, 1775, the Synod exhorted the people to en- 
deavor to maintain union, to treat with respect, and 
encourage the Continental Congress, then sitting at 
Philadelphia, by letting it be seen that "the whole 
strength of this vast country " can be brought out to 
carry their resolutions into execution. At the same 
meeting, the Synod earnestly recommended it to all the 
congregations under their care, to spend the afternoon 
of the last Thursday in every month in public solemn 
prayer to God, during the continuance of the struggle. 

During the occupation of Jamaica by the British 
army, Mr. Burnet was permitted to preach undisturbed, 
and by his influence with the loyalists, preserved the 
Presbyterian Church from destruction, during the war. 
Mr. Onderdonk, in his " Revolutionary Incidents," has 
preserved many interesting facts relating to this period. 
To his work I am indebted for the following : 

Soon after the British were established in Jamaica, 
a parcel of loyalists perched themselves in the belfry 
of the Presbyterian Church, and commenced sawing 
oflf the steeple. Word was brought to the pastor, the 



104 MR. buenet's ministry 

Rev. Mr. Burnet. Whitehead Hicks, Mayor of New- 
York, happened to be at his house, and as Burnet was 
a loyalist, soon put a stop to the outrage. 

Mr. Burnet, (who had married an Episcopalian,) 
was the only Presbyterian minister in the county re- 
puted to be a friend of government, and was therefore 
allowed to preach here during the whole war. 
Although he saved the church from desecration, yet 
after the peace, party spirit ran so high that he was 
forced to leave. 

The Highlanders attended his church, and sat by 
themselves in the galleries. Some had their wives with 
them, and several children were baptized. Once when 
the sexton had neglected to provide water, and was 
about to go for it, the thoughtful mother called him 
back, and drew a bottle of it from her pocket. — Pp. 151, 
152. 

Agi-eeably to Mr. Onderdonk's statement, our Regis- 
ter shows that a considerable number of infants of 
soldiers belonging to the 71st, 74th, and 80th Regi- 
ments, were baptized by Mr. Burnet. " Jamaica was 
occupied by soldiers during the whole war, especially 
in winter, when the soldiers cantoned here, after their 
summer expeditions." Mr. Onderdonk also states, that 
Gen. Oliver Delancey, who had been appointed by 
Howe to induce the loyalists to join the king's troops, 
had his quarters at Jamaica for some time, at the par- 
sonage-house of the Rev. Mr. Burnet. 

But if the minister was a friend of the government, 
his people did not generally take him for an example, 
in that respect. I cannot forbear, in this connexion, 
to give from the same interesting volume, the account 
of Elias Baylis, an elder of this church, whose descend- 
ants are numerous in this congregation, three of his 



MR. BURNET S MINISTRY. 105 

grand-children being ruling elders at this time, and 
whose only surviving child, Mrs. Abigail Carpenter, is 
our oldest communicant, having made a profession of 
religion nearly sixty years ago : 

The day after Gen. Woodhull's capture, (August 
28th, 1776,) Elias Baylis, Chairman of the Jamaica 
Committee, was walking over to Nathaniel Smith's, at 
the One-Mile Mill, to hear the news, when he was ar- 
rested by a neighbor, who wished to do something to 
ingratiate himself with the British. 

When the venerable man, blind as he was, was 
brought before the British officer at Jamaica, he ex- 
claimed in surprise, " Why do you bring this man here ? 
He's blind : he can do no harm." The unfeeling 
wretch who had informed against him, replied : " He's 
blind, but he can talk." Baylis did not attempt to con- 
ciliate the officer, but unfortunately dropped a few 
words in vindication of the American cause. This 
was enough. He was shut up in the Presbyterian 
church that night, and next day carried to the prison 
at New Utrecht.* He was subsequently removed to 
the Provost in New- York. 

Elias Baylis was an elder of the Presbyterian 
church, and stood high in the community for upright- 
ness and ability. He had a sweet voice, and could 
sing whole psalms and hymns from memory : it will 
not be surprising, then, to find him beguiling his dreary 
imprisonment in singing, among others, the 142d Psalm : 

* Daniel Duryee, (afterwards assemblyman), Wm. Furman, Wm. 
Creed, and two others, were put in one pew in New Utrecht church. 
Baylis wanted them to get the Bible out of the pulpit and read to him. 
They feared to do it, but led the blind man to the pulpit steps. As he 
returned with it, a British guard met him, beat him violently, and took 
away the book. They were three weeks at New Utrecht, and then 
marched down to the prison-ship. 



106 MR, burnet's ministry. 

Lord, I am brought exceeding low, 

Now let thine ear attend, 
And make my foes, who vex me, know 

I've an Almighty Friend. 

From my sad prison set me free, 

Then shall I praise thy name ; 
And holy men shall join with me 

Thy kindness to proclaim. 

The aged man was visited in prison by his wife 
and daughter. After a confinement of about two 
months, at the intercession of his friends, he was re- 
leased, barely in time to breathe his last without a pris- 
on's walls. He died in crossing the ferry with his 
daughter, and his mortal remains now repose, without 
a stone to mark the spot, or commemorate his worth. 

The heartless wretch who arrested him, fled on the 
return of peace, to Nova Scotia, dreading the vengeance 
of his fellow-citizens ; but after two years' exile, he 
ventured to return, but looked so poor and forlorn, that 
he was never molested. 

Many other Whigs were seized and sent off to the 
prison-ship, and among them John Thurston, Robert 
Hinchman, and David Lamberson, who were Presby- 
terians. Daniel Smith was confined in the church 
about a week, with old Daniel Baylis. The officer in 
charge said to Baylis, " You'll see England." Baylis 
replied, " 'Twill be a sight — won't it ?" Increase Car- 
penter was a commissary to the American army ; John 
J. Skidmore went away for safety, and did not return 
until after peace had been declared. 

But to return to Mr. Burnet. At the close of the 
war, the influential men of his congregation, who had 
been scattered in various directions, returned to their 
homes ; and, as may well be supposed, were not alto- 



MR. burnet's ministry. 107 

gether satisfied with the course their minister had 
taken. He still, however, had many warmly-attached 
friends, who argued that it was through his instrumen- 
tality, that the church had been saved from desolation, 
and it would be ungrateful to turn him away.* But 
Mr. Burnet found it necessary to resign his charge. 
At the close of his farewell service, he gave out the 
120th Psalm, which will afford an idea of the state of 
feeling on both sides *. 

Hard lot of mine ! my days are cast 

Among the sons of strife, 
Whose never-ceasing quarrels waste 

My golden hours of life. 

O ! might I fiy to change my place, 

How would I choose to dwell 
In some wide, lonesome wilderness, 

And leave these gates of hell. 

Peace is the blessing that I seek, 

How lovely are its charms ! 
I am for peace ; but when I speak. 

They all declare for arms. 

In Mr. Faitoute's " Brief History" of the Church, 
he thus speaks of Mr. Burnet ; " For the greater part 
of the time Mr. Burnet was with this people, it was a 
time peculiarly distressing. Being seated near the 
ocean, and possession being soon after gained by the 
British troops, after their taking the city of New- York, 
a number of the Whigs made their escape from them, 

* I have been informed, by an intelligent aged person, who was inti- 
mate in Mr. Burnet's family, that he never spoke either in favor of or 
against the British government, and that some supposed he was at 
heart a sincere Whig. ^ 



108 MR. Burnet's ministry. 

leaving their possessions, and many friends still on the 
Island. I have been told an attempt was made to de- 
stroy the Presbyterian Church, or at least to render it 
unfit for holding worship in it, which Mr. B. by his in- 
fluence prevented ; and that he saved the woodland from 
being entirely cut off by the enemy. After the evacu- 
ation of New- York, and the return of those members 
of the Society who had fled, some disagreement arose 
between Mr. B. and his people, which occasioned a de- 
sire in him to be liberated from his charge, and he was 
accordingly liberated by the Presbytery of New- York 
in May, 1785." He received a call from Norwalk, 
Conn., where he settled Nov. 2d, 1785, as pastor of the 
First Congregational Church. He annually visited Ja- 
maica, and in 1790, being invited, he preached to an 
overflowing assembly, in the Presbyterian Church, 
from John iv. 35-38. Say not ye, there are yet four 
months, &c. His sermon was published in the Ameri- 
can Preacher, Vol. II., and is entitled, " Moral Reflec- 
tions upon the Season of Harvest." In its conclusion, 
he addressed first the minister and then the people. 
In his address to Mr. Faitoute, he thus alluded to his 
connection with the congregation during the war : " In 
the days of my youth I was by the laying on of hands, 
and particular designation of the Pi'esbytery, placed in 
this part of the great field of Christ's Church, where 
numbers of faithful laborers had been before, with a 
solemn charge to labor in it, and watch over it. For 
several years I devoted myself to this my charge ; and 
though with many imperfections, I acknowledge I did 
it, yet never with a dishonest heart. In troublous and 
perilous times, I kept it, labored in it, and watched 



MR. faitoute's ministry. 109 

over it, readily contributing both by word and deed, 
whatever was in my power for its protection, cultiva- 
tion, and growth, in the fruits of truth and righteous- 
ness." 

Mr. Burnet continued at Norwalk until his death 
which took place June 30, 1806. The Rev. N. S. 
Prime, in his history of Long Island, says that he re- 
members this event with solemn interest. He preached 
for Dr. Burnet on the preceeding day, and parted from 
him on Monday morning, about two hours before his 
sudden exit. 

The Rev. James Glassbrook was received as an 
ordained minister from England by the New- York 
Presbytery, in 1786 ; and began to preach here, March 
11th, 1786. He so far gained upon the regards of the 
people as to have a call put into his hands ; but some 
difficulties arose, and the prospect of settlement failed. 
He continued here till Nov. 1787, and was for a time 
stated supply at Pittsgrove (formerly Pilesgrove), Cum- 
berland Co. N. J. In 1790, he was dismissed from the 
Presbytery of New- York to join the Presbytery of 
Baltimore. Rev. Asa Hillyer, D. D., afterwards of 
Orange N. J., preached for about six months, in the 
year 1788. Messrs. Thompson, Templeton, Tate, Close, 
Roe, Brush, White, Woodhull, and Hart preached here 
during the rest of that year, and the former part of 
1789. Mr. White preached as a candidate for several 
months, and many were pleased with him, but the Rev. 

GEORGE FAITOUTE 

was the next pastor. He was was of Huguenot de- 
scent, born in the city of New- York in 1750 ; and dur- 



110 MR. faitoute's ministry. 

ing his early years attended the Episcopal Church. 
He graduated at the College of New Jersey in 1774. 
He was ordained by New Brunswick Presbytery, 
pastor of Allentown, N. J., in 1779, and remained 
till April, 1782, when he was installed at Greenwich, 
in Cohanzy, by the Presbytery of Philadelphia. In 
May, 1789, a call was put into his hands from Ja- 
maica. " This call," he says in his " Brief History," 
written in 1793, "after duly weighing and' considering 
of it, I conceived it my duty to accept, and accordingly 
declared my ready acceptance of it, at a meeting of the 
Presbytery of Philadelphia, held at Philadelphia, June 
16, 1789, as may be seen in the records of the Pres- 
bytery. In the month of July following, I arrived at 
Jamaica with my family, and entered the parsonage 
house without those difficulties, which some of my 
predecessors had experienced from the zeal of a few 
bigotted Episcopalians, who were not original proprie- 
tors in this place. Since the Revolution, some time in 
the year 1784, this Church obtained a Charter, which 
has secured to them their church property, and trou- 
bles of this nature we hope will no more arise." 

"A dispute had subsisted for some time whether 
this church belonged to and was under the care of the 
Presbytery of Suffolk, which then existed, and was 
afterwards dissolved by an Act of the Synod of New- 
York and New Jersey. But upon the application of 
the congregation to the Synod, by their commissioners, 
after I had come among them, the Synod, at their 
meeting in Elizabethtown, Oct. 1789, did agree to an- 
nex this congregation to the Presbytery of New- York, 
with which they so much desired to be connected, and 



MR. FAITOUTE S MINISTRY. Ill 

with which they believed themselves to have been 
always connected, notwithstanding the claims of Suf- 
folk Presbytery. In consequence of this Act of Synod 
I took my dismission from said Presbytery, and was 
received by that of New- York, who appointed a com- 
mission to attend at Jamaica, and proceed to my in- 
stallation. The commission were Rev. Dr. Rodgers, 
and Dr. McKnight, who attended at the time appoint- 
ed — 15th Dec, 1789. Dr. McKnight preached the in- 
stallation sermon, and Dr. Rodgers gave the charge, 
and made the exhortation to the people." 

" The records of this church have been rather defi- 
cient, but such as we have are at hand, and may be 
consulted. This church consists now of 96 heads 
of families ; the individuals composing these families 
amount to 539 persons, besides my own family, who in 
all are 12 persons. The communicants are 58 persons. 
Since my settlement a few have been added, in this 
respect, to the church. God grant a revival of pure 
religion among us ! Public worship is indeed very 
well attended, and so many often attend the preaching 
of the Gospel, that commonly there is not room enough 
in the Church to give all the hearers comfortable seats." 

Mr. Faitoute continued the beloved pastor of this 
Church for nearly twenty-six years, a considerably 
longer period than any of the other ministers. He 
was suddenly removed from his labors on earth to his 
reward in heaven, on the Lord's day, Aug. 21, 1815, 
having preached, with his usual vigor, in the morning, 
aged 65 years. His sepulchre is with us, in the bury- 
ing-ground, belonging to this congregation. 

A sermon of his was published in the " American 



112 MR. faitoute's ministry. 

Preacher," and I have read others in MS. He wrote 
in a simple earnest style. He was one of the original 
Trustees of Union Hall Academy, and in 1797 was 
employed as Principal of this Institution, attending at 
the same time, to his pastoral duties ; he is still remem- 
bered with respect and affection by those of his pupils 
who survive. 

It was during Mr. Faitoute's ministry that our 
present house of worship was erected. The old stone 
Church had stood nearly or quite 120 years; and there 
are many, at this time, in the congregation, who, in 
their childhood and youth, knew no other place of wor- 
ship. It was taken down in 1813, and a portion of the 
stones of which it was composed were used in laying 
the foundations of the new edifice, which was solemnly 
dedicated to the service of God on the 18th day of 
January, A. D. 1814. The service was as follows : 

Introductory Prayer by Dr. Milldoler. 

Read 2 Chron. 6th Chapter. 

Sung Psalm 132 — tune New Salem. 

Dedicatory Prayer by Dr. Milldoler. 

Sung Psalm 84 — tune Coronation. 

Sermon by Dr. Milldoler from John ii. 17. 

Concluding Prayer by Dr. Basset of Bushwick. 

Sung Hymn 128, Second Book — tune Mount Olive. 

Benediction by Mr. Faitoute. 

Mr. Faitoute lived to preach in this house about one 
year and a half; and but one of the building committee, 
Mr. James Herriman, survives. The house was com- 
pleted with a steeple, the top of which was 102 feet 
above the ground, and was much admired for its sym- 
metry, but which was taken down a number of years 



MR. weed's ministry. 113 

since, on account of an injury which it was supposed 
to have received in the great September gale. In the 
spring of 1846 this house was enlarged by the addition 
of 13|- feet, making it 90 feet in length. It is about 
46 feet wide, and contains 144 pews. At the time the 
lot on which it stands was purchased, the old parsonage, 
which was the house adjoining the premises of the late 
Judge Lamberson, now occupied by Mrs. Stoddard, 
near the corner of Fulton and Beaver streets, and the 
glebe which extended south, along the Beaver Pond, 
towards Mr. G. Phraner's, were sold, and the place 
where the minister now lives purchased. The present 
glebe includes about nine acres of valuable land. There 
is also a wood-lot of considerable extent, in Springfield, 
belonging to the congregation, besides other property 
to a considerable amount. The Rev. 

HENRY^R .WEED, D. D. 

succeeded Mr. Faitoute. He was born at Ballston, 
graduated at Union College in 1812, studied Theology 
at Princeton, was called here in 1815, and ordained as 
pastor Jan. 4th, 1816. Mr. Weed was a much esteemed 
minister. His labors were greatly blessed. An exten- 
sive revival of religion commenced during the first year 
of his settlement, as the blessed fruit of which above 
eighty persons were added to the communion of the 
church. He discountenanced the practice of furnishing 
ardent spirits at funerals ; (it was the custom to carry 
it round to the assembled people in decanters ;) and for 
many years this practice has been unknown. He also 
decHned to baptize the children of parents, not in full 



114 MR. funck's ministry. 

communion, from which it is evident that a contrary 
practice had prevailed. 

In 1822 he M^as dismissed and took charge of a 
church in Albany. Dr. Weed is at present pastor of 
the Presbyterian Church at Wheeling, Va. He is the 
only survivor of all the former ministers of this church. 
" Questions on the Confession of Faith," &c., published 
by the Presbyterian Board of Publication, were prepared 
by him. The Rev. 

SEYMOUR P. FUNCK, 

who graduated at Columbia College in 1819, and studied 
theology in the Theological Seminary of the Reformed 
Dutch Church at New Brunswick, N. J., was the next 
minister. He was ordained here March 6th, 1823. 
Some dissatisfaction arising in the congregation, the 
details of which need not be given, the pastoral relation 
was dissolved May 9th 1825, and he left the place, car- 
rying with him the warm affection of ardent friends. 
Mr. Funck was never re-settled in the ministry. He 
died a few years after leaving this place, and was 
buried at Flatlands. 

The Rev. Asahel Nettleton, D. D., well known for 
his eminently useful labors, far and wide in the churches, 
was in the providence of God directed hither, during 
the winter of 1826, when the congregation was in a 
very divided and distracted state. He commenced his 
labors on the 24th of February, and continued them 
till the following November. He was in a feeble state 
of health, so that he did not attend many extra meetings, 
nor spend much time in visiting. But his labors were 
remarkably blessed. On the 2d of July, the Lord's 



MR. NETTLETOn's LABORS. 115 

Supper was celebrated and 72 persons were added to 
the church, on profession ; eighteen were baptized. 
From that day the revival received a new impulse. 
It was often observed, that it seemed (so great was the 
solemnity) like the Judgment day. A number of stran- 
gers visited the town and went home rejoicing in hope. 
So many from other places visited him, while here, 
that Mr. Nettleton thought of devoting one evening in 
the week to conversation with strangers. 

He fell asleep in the arms of his Saviour, in January, 
1843. 

Shortly after the publication of his Memoirs, by Dr. 
Tyler, the following interesting account, written by a 
gentleman, formerly a physician in Jamaica, appeared 
in the New- York Observer : 

" In perusing the life of Mr. Nettleton, by Dr. Tyler, 
I have had brought vividly to my recollection, scenes 
and circumstances connected with the revival of reli- 
gion in Jamaica in 1826, of deep interest to me ; and 
although more than eighteen years have passed, their 
interest is as deep as ever, and I think strikingly illus- 
trates the wisdom and prudence of that truly wonderful 
man in dealing with awakened sinners. 

" The first time I ever saw Mr. Nettleton, was on a 
communion Sabbath in the early part of the winter of 
1826. Two strangers entered the church, and walking 
slowly up the aisle, seated themselves in the front pew. 
Many eyes were fastened upon them ; and, after ser- 
vice, as is common in the country, many inquiries were 
made as to who they were, for they were evidently 



116 MR. NETTLETON S LABORS. 

clergymen, It was some time before I learned that 
one of them was the ' Rev. Mr. Nettleton, the great 
revival preacher.' The church in Jamaica, as is men- 
tioned in the memoir, had been greatly divided. We 
were literally two bands, hostile to each other, and bit- 
ter in feeling. The Apostle might have said of us, we 
were hateful, and hating one another ; and there seem- 
ed but little prospect of our ever being any better. It 
was but a sad spectacle on that day presented to this 
man of God. 

" When, a few days after, I heard that Mr. Nettle- 
ton, the revival preacher, was soon going to preach for 
us, I never shall forget my feelings. 1 determined I 
would not hear him, and especially so when an old dis- 
ciple, long since in glory, Mr. Othniel Smith, who had 
listened with rapture to George Whitefield, seventy 
years before, when he preached in Jamaica, said to 
me — ' This Mr. Nettleton, that is going to preach for 
us, is a most wonderful man ; he is said to be the great- 
est preacher that has been among us since the days of 
George Whitefield.' He said further, that, from what 
he had heard of him, he believed he could almost read 
a man's heart, so wonderful was his knowledge of hu- 
man nature. I well remember I secretly said, *He 
shall not see my heart, for I will not let him see me,' 
so bitterly did I dread any thing like close, experimen- 
tal preaching, 

" I had long been a professor of religion, having 
united with the Rutgers-street church in 1812, while 
Dr. Milldoler was the pastor, and notwithstanding I 
had always been outwardly consistent, (regularly ob- 



I 



MR. NETTLETON's LABORS. 117 

serving secret and family prayer, constant in my at- 
tendance upon all the meetings of the church, as well 
the public services of the Sabbath as the w^eekly lec- 
ture, and the social circle for prayer, and active in all 
the benevolent operations of the day,) notw^ithstanding 
all this seeming consistency of character, there was 
always a fearful whisper from the faithful monitor 
within, that all was not right. There was a secret 
dread of self-examination, an unwillingness to know 
the worst respecting my case, and the idea of coming 
in contact with a man who would be likely to expose 
my shallowness, if not hypocrisy, I could not endure. 
And, accordingly, I resolved that something should de- 
tain me from church when Mr. Nettleton preached. 
But, although I sought diligently for any excuse, one 
even the least plausible, yet I could not find one ; and, 
contrary to my secret determination, I went to church, 
at the appropriate time, with my family. 

" After the Sabbath, numbers of the church members 
called upon Mr. Nettleton, at his lodgings, to welcome 
him among us ; and I was repeatedly requested to do 
so with the rest : but day after day I contrived to ex- 
cuse myself, although I knew it was a civility that was 
expected of me. At length a brother, who had often 
urged me to go, called upon me to know if I would not 
take Mr. Nettleton a little ride in my gig, as he was in 
feeble health, having but just recovered from a pro- 
tracted illness ; adding, that he found riding not only 
beneficial, but necessary, and he knew that I could do 
it just as well as not. 

" I never shall forget my feelings at this proposition. 
I at first refused outright, and was vexed that the prop- 



118 MR. nettleton's labors. 

osition should have been made. I treated the brother 
rudely. He, however, continued to urge, and said he 
had gone so far as to tell Mr. Nettleton he knew I 
would do it cheerfully. But it was all to no purpose. 
I did not do it that day, but consented to call upon him 
the next morning, with my gig, at ten o'clock, if he 
would be ready. The next morning, accordingly, I 
called at the appointed time, and was introduced to 
him on the sidewalk ; and never did culprit dread the 
face of his judge, more than 1 dreaded to be brought 
face to face with a man who, it was said, could almost 
read the heart. 

" I received him politely, and we soon entered into 
a pleasant conversation, about almost any thing and 
every thing except personal religion. This I scrupu- 
lously avoided. I found he was in feeble health, and 
somewhat given to hypochondria ; therefore I felt as- 
sured I could entertain him by talking about his own 
ailments. In less than one hour all my unpleasant feel- 
ings had vanished, and I felt as free and easy with him 
as if I was riding with some long tried friend ; and that 
which I so much dreaded, became to me at once a 
source of great pleasure and of much profit. 

" The first day he rode with me about six miles ; and 
after that, for seven months, very few pleasant days 
passed that we did not ride together from five to twen- 
ty-five miles. I became deeply interested in him as a 
man and as a preacher. Why I at first liked his preach- 
ing I cannot exactly say ; but I was unwilling to be 
absent from a single meeting. The class of subjects 
he chose as his theme of discourse, was new. The 
distracted state of the congregation, led those clergy- 



MR. NETTLETON's LABORS. 119 

men who supplied our pulpit, to select some subject 
connected with Christian duty. Brotherly love, if I 
remember right, was the subject of discourse seven 
times in about three months. On the contrary, Mr. 
Nettleton presented the claims of God and the duty of 
sinners, and here I remember we had no opportunity of 
scrutinizing the sermon, to endeavor to ascertain on 
which side of the division the preacher was. This I 
considered a master stroke of policy. 

" Thus, smoothly and pleasantly, comparatively 
speaking, it passed along with me for about two weeks, 
when one evening he announced from the desk, that he 
felt some encouragement to believe that the Lord was 
about to grant us a blessing. He said he had seen sev- 
eral individuals who were anxious for their souls, and 
two or three who indulged hope. How it would end 
with them he could not say, but he wanted the church 
to walk softly before the Lord, to be much in prayer, 
&c., &c. I felt then that my own case required look- 
ing into at once, or I was lost ; and I resolved soon to 
attend to it, nor to let the present opportunity pass. 
Mr. Nettleton had never yet said one word to me on 
the subject of experimental religion, although I had been 
with him a great deal. 

" The next day, as usual, I called for him to ride. I 
was obliged to go to Flushing that day, distant about 
five miles. Just as we were ascending the hill, a little 
out of the village, and before any subject of conversa- 
tion had been introduced, and the horse on a slow 
walk, he gently placed his hand upon my knee and said 
— ' Well, my dear friend, how is it with you ? I hope 
it is all peace within.' I could not speak for some 



120 MR. nettleton's labors. 

minutes. He said no more, and there was no occasion, 
for an arrow had pierced my inmost soul. My emo- 
tion was overwhelming. At length, after recovering a 
little self-possession, I broke the silence by telling him 
frankly I was not happy — there was no peace within — 
all was war ! war ! ! war ! ! ! His manner was so kind, 
he instantly won my confidence, and I unburdened my 
soul to him. I told him how I had felt for years past, 
and how very unhappy at times I had been. 

" He did not seem inclined to talk. All he said was 
occasionally ' Well — well — well ' — with his peculiar 
cadence. At length he said he did not feel very well, 
and he wanted to be still. This was a request he often 
made, and I thought nothing of it. I have rode miles 
and miles with him, and not a word has passed between 
us after such a request. 

"I continued to ride with him once and twice a day ; 
but although I was anxious to converse, he said but 
little to me, except occasionally he would drop a remark 
calculated to make me feel worse instead of better — at 
times greatly deepening my distress. Some months af- 
terwards, I spoke to him about this part of our inter- 
course. He said he did it intentionally, for he had 
reason to believe many an awakened sinner had his 
convictions all talked away, and he talked into a false 
hope. 

" Two or three days after he first spoke to me 
on the subject of religion, he called at my house, and 
requested me to go and see a particular individual 
whom he named, and who was under distress of mind, 
and pray with her. I told him that I could not do 
such a thing as that, for I was not a Christian myself 



MR. NETTLETON S LABORS. 121 

He replied — " But you do not mean that your not being 
a Christian releases you from Christian obligations ? If 
you do, you are greatly in error. Good morning !" and 
he left me rather abruptly. In the afternoon, when I 
rode with him, he did not ask me if I had attended to his 
request, for he knew I had not. He only made the 
request, as he afterwards told me, to thrust deeper the 
arrow of conviction : and it had the desired effect. 
My distress became very great, and I was unfitted for 
my ordinary duties. I felt as if there was but little 
hope for such a hardened sinner as I was. 

" About this time he appointed a meeting of inquiry. 
I told him that I should be there for one. He said 
I must not attend on any account — it was only intend- 
ed for anxious sinners. 1 told him I certainly should 
be there, unless he absolutely forbade it. " I do," said 
he, with more than ordinary earnestness. " Then," said 
I, " you must promise me that you will appoint a meet- 
ing for anxious professors." He made no reply. This 
anxious meeting was the first he appointed in Jamaica. 
It was to be held at the house of a dear friend of mine, 
and one who knew something of the state of my mind. 
I went there in the afternoon, and made arrangements 
to be concealed in an adjoining bed-room, the door of 
which could not be shut, the bed being placed against 
it. I was on the ground an hour before the time ap- 
pointed. Mr. Nettleton came soon after, to arrange the 
seats ; about this he was very particular. He came 
into the bed-room where I was concealed two or three 
times ; he wanted the door closed, but he found it could 
not be without disarranging the furniture, and he gave 
it up. He did not know I was there until some weeks 

6 



122 MR. nettleton's labors. 

afterwards. The temptation to be present at that 
meeting I could not resist. Some how I had received 
an impression that my salvation depended upon it. I 
had heard so often about persons being converted in an 
anxious meeting, that I thought if I could only be pres- 
ent at such a meeting, that was all that was necessary, 
and therefore I was not only willing to run the risk of 
offending Mr. Nettleton, but willing to submit to al- 
most any humiliating circumstance to accomplish my 
object. I thought it was altogether a piece of cruelty 
in Mr. Nettleton to forbid my being present, and I 
determined to carry my point privately, if I could not 
openly. 

" Situated as I was, I could hear next to nothing as to 
what was transpiring in the anxious room. Mr. Net- 
tleton addressed those present individually, and in a 
very low tone of voice, bordering upon a whisper. As 
he approached the open door, I could occasionally catch 
a sentence, and hear a deep and anxious sob — but these 
words, and broken sentences, and sobs, were loud and 
pointed sermons to me. I wanted to get out from my 
hiding place, that I might give vent to my pent-up feel- 
ings ; and my anxiety to be released, appeared to be 
greater than it was to be present. At times, it seemed 
as if I must cry out in bitterness of spirit, so agonizing 
were my feelings ; especially so as I heard him say to 
one individual — " Is it possible ? Well, I am afraid 
you will lose your impressions, and if you should, what 
will become of you ? If the Spirit is grieved to return 
no more, you will lose your soul." After going around 
the room, and conversing with each individual, he 
made a few general remarks applicable to all, respect- 



MR. NETTLETOn's LABORS. 123 

ing the danger of grieving God's Holy Spirit, and then 
dismissed the meeting after a short prayer. 

" Instead of feeling any better after this meeting, as 
I expected to do, I felt worse and worse. Sleep was 
now taken from me, and I felt that death was better 
than life. Either that night or the next, I forget which, 
but remember it was the 27th April, I got out of bed 
about 12 o'clock, and went out into the woods. It 
was exceedingly dark. I fell down at the foot of a tree 
and cried aloud for mercy, in agony of soul. I felt that 
God was just in punishing me. I felt that the longest 
and the severest punishment he could inflict was no 
more than I deserved ; my sins, my aggravated sins, 
appeared so great. I remained out of doors the most 
of the night. In the morning early, before 1 went 
home, I called at Mr. Nettleton's lodgings. He sent 
word that he could not see me at that hour. I went 
away, and returned in an hour or so ; he told the ser- 
vant to request me to be seated, and he would be with 
me in a few minutes. 

" Every minute now seemed an hour, and a long one 
too. For nearly thirty minutes he kept me in this state 
of horrible suspense, during which I was constantly 
pacing the floor with my watch in my hand. When 
at length he entered the room, I threw my arms round 
his neck, told him, I was in perfect agony, and that I 
should die if he did not in some way comfort me. I 
told him it seemed as if I could not live another hour 
in such distress. 

" ' / can't help you, my dear friend, you must not 
look to me ;' and he burst into a flood of tears. 



124 MR. nettleton's labors. 

" ' What shall I do ? what shall I do ?' I repeated 
over and over again, in a loud voice. 

" ' You must yield your heart to Christ, or you are 
lost !' said he ; and adding, ' 1 do certainly think your 
situation a very alarming and dangerous one.' 

" After a few minutes, he said, ' Come, let us kneel 
down.' This was contrary to his usual practice. He 
made a very short prayer, not more than a minute in 
length, rose from his knees, advised me to go home, and 
remain in my room, and abruptly left me, almost over- 
come with emotion. Had there been any means of 
self-destruction within my reach, I believe I should have 
employed it, so agonizing were my feelings. He sent 
word to me by a young friend that he did not wish to 
ride that day. I passed the most of the day in my room, 
on my knees. Occasionally, I walked for a few min- 
utes in my garden, and then returned to my room. It 
was the just and the eter7ial displeasure of an angry 
God that seemed to crush me to the earth. About the 
middle of the afternoon, one of the elders came to see 
me. He expressed surprise at my distress, said there 
was no necessity for my feeling so bad, he knew there 
was not. He tried to pursuade me it would all be 
well with me soon. I told him that if he could satisfy 
me that it would ever be well with me, I would gladly 
and cheerfully endure my sufferings thousands of years. 
This feeling I distinctly remember. The justice of God, 
and the eternity of his anger, distressed me most. 
I sent for Mr. Nettleton, but he excused himself, and 
did not come. 

' Thus every refuge failed me, 
And all my hopes were crossed.' 



MR. NETTLETOn's LABORS. 125 

It was past the middle of the afternoon, and approach- 
ing sun-down, and I had not yet broken my fast. After 
a short walk in the garden, I again entered my room, 
locked the door, and threw myself prostrate on my 
settee as near a state of hopeless despair as I can con- 
ceive a mortal to be, on this side the bottomless pit. 
I cried aloud, ' O my God ! how long — how long, O my 
God, my God !' After repeating this and similar lan- 
guage several times, I seemed to sink away into a state 
of insensibility. When I came to myself 1 was upon 
my knees, praying not for myself but for others. I 
felt submission to the will of God, willing that he should 
do with me as should seem good in his sight. My con- 
cern for myself seemed all lost in concern for others. 
Terror seemed all exchanged for love, and despair for 
hope. God was glorious, and Christ unspeakably pre- 
cious. I was an overwhelming wonder to myself. 
The cry of ' Blessed Jesus — blessed Jesus !' took the 
place of * Lord have mercy.' 

" After remaining in my room half an hour, or there- 
abouts, I came down stairs, and met my dear wife, who 
had deeply sympathized with me in my distress. I ex- 
claimed, ' I have found Him, I have found Him, and 
He is a precious Saviour !' She was very much over- 
come. She persuaded me to take some focd, but I was 
so happy and so anxious to go to meeting, the bell hav- 
ing rung, that I could eat but little. I went over to 
the session house ; it was crowded — benches in the 
aisle were filled. I obtained a seat near the door. 
Mr. Nettleton was reading the 211th Hymn of the Vil- 
lage Collection — 



12G MR. nettleton's labors. 

' Of all the joys we mortals know, 
Jesus, thy love exceeds the rest,' &c. 

I thought 1 never heard so sweet a hymn nor so dehght- 
ful music. I sung it at the top of my voice, of which 
however I was not aware until I saw I had attracted 
the observation of all near me. My eyes were stream- 
ing with tears, while my countenance was beaming 
with delight, as a friend afterwards told me. I wanted 
to tell to all around what a Saviour I had found. 

" After service, I walked home with Mr. Nettleton, 
and remained with him a few minutes. ' I knew this 
morning,' said he, ' that the turning point was not far 
off.' He cautioned me, again and again, against giving 
way to my feelings ; urged me to keep humble and 
prayerful, and not say much to any one. That night 
I could not sleep for joy. I do not think I closed my 
eyes. I found myself singing several times in the night. 
In the morning all nature seemed in a new dress, and 
vocal with the praises of a God all glorious. Every 
thing seemed changed, and I could scarcely realize that 
one, only yesterday so wretched, was now so happy. 
I felt it perfectly reasonable that he who had had much 
forgiven should love much. I think I sincerely inquired 
' Lord, what wilt thou have me to do ?' And though 
eighteen years have passed, God is still glorious and 
Christ still precious to my soul ; and unless I am greatly 
deceived, I still pray for a knowledge of my duty, and 
for grace to do it. I know that I still love to do good 
and make others happy ; and of all anticipated delights 
which I can place before my mind, that of the enjoy- 
ment of sinless perfection in heaven is the greatest. 



MR. crane's ministry. 127 

But never was a sense of my unworthiness greater 
than it is at present. 

'• What was there in me that could merit esteem 

Or give the Creator delight ? 
'Twas ' even so, Father,' I ever must sing, 

' Because it seem'd good in thy sight.' 
Then give all the glory to his holy name, 

To him all the glory belongs, 
Be mine the high joy still to sound forth his fame. 

And crown him in each of my songs." 

" Many who are still living in Jamaica will know 
who the author of this communication is, without the 
addition of my initials. T. W. B." 

TVoy, N. Y., Oct. 29, 1844. 

The Rev, 

ELIAS W. CRANE, 

my lamented predecessor, was born at Elizabethtown, 
N. J., on the 18th of March, 1796. " When yet a boy 
from six to eight years of age, he was serious and con- 
scientious in his morning and evening devotions." "His 
serious turn of mind, and his great devotion to reading, 
and readiness of acquisition, led his parents to entertain 
the idea that it was their duty to give him a collegiate 
education." When about sixteen years of age he en- 
tered the Junior Class in Princeton College, where he 
graduated in Sept. 1814. During his residence in 
Morristown, N. J., while engaged in the business of 
teaching, he made a public profession of his faith in 
Christ, and attached himself to the church in that place, 
then under the care of Rev. Dr. Wm. McDowell, on 



128 MR. crane's ministry. 

the 2d day of March, 1816. On the 8th of Oct., 1818, 
by the Presbytery of Jersey he was hcensed to preach 
the gospel. Dec. 1819, he received and accepted a call 
from the church at Springfield, N. J., and was ordained 
there Jan. 5th, 1820. He remained here seven years, a 
devoted and useful pastor, and was permitted to rejoice 
greatly in seeing the work of the Lord prosper in his 
hands. In the year 1825 the Lord poured out his 
Spirit on that people, and very many were brought 
from death unto life. In the month of May, 1825, the 
church in Jamaica became vacant by the removal of 
the Rev. Mr. Funck its pastor. The people were in a 
state of no little distraction, when, as if for the purpose 
of healing their divisions, God in his providence direct- 
ed hither the footsteps of the Rev. A. Nettleton, D. D. 
At his departure he recommended Mr. Crane to the 
people as a fit person to become their pastor. The 
great blessing he was made to this people, proves the 
sagacity of Mr. N. as to ministerial character. The 
pastoral relation of Mr. C. to the church of Springfield 
was dissolved, and he was dissmissed from the Presby- 
tery of Elizabethtown on the 17th Oct., 1826, and on 
the 31st of the same month he was, by the Presbytery 
of New- York, installed pastor of the Church of Jamai- 
ca. Jamaica must be regarded as the chief scene of 
his usefulness. Here he spent fourteen years, almost 
the third of his whole life. " When he entered this 
field," remarks Dr. Murray, in a sermon preached at 
Elizabethtown, Nov. 29, 1840, on the occasion of his 
death, and from which most of the facts concerning 
Mr. C. have been derived, " the cloud of mercy was 
withdrawing for a season, but spanned with the bow of 



MR. CRANE S MINISTRY. 129 

promise that it would again return to water the seed 
he was beginning to sow ; — when called away in the 
midst of his labors, the same cloud was retiring, after 
fulfilling all the hopes it had once inspired, glittering 
all over with the same bright bow, as if at once to 
illume and beautify his path to his rest and his reward. 
A few communions before his departure, it was his pri- 
vilege and joy to receive nearly eighty into the church, 
and among them three of his own children. — Mr. C. 
was aflfected with a disease, not unlike the asthma, 
whose violent and frequent attacks admonished him as 
to the manner of his departure. But he continued 
cheerful and constant in the discharge of his official 
duties, feeling that he was immortal until his work was 
done. On the evening of his decease, and but a few 
hours previous to its occurrence, he was preaching in 
a private house, in a distant part of his congregation, 
and exhorted his hearers with unusual fervency from 
the text, ' But now they desire a better country, that 
is, an heavenly.' The services were concluded by the 
hymn, the last he ever read or sang on earth : 

'•' We've no abiding city here, 

This may distress tlie worldly mind, 
But should not cost the saint a tear, 
Who hopes a better rest to find." 

After the services were over, he returned to the 
bosom of his family. Mrs. C. was absent on a visit to 
a sister at Nor\yich, Conn., and Mr. C. had made ar- 
rangements to leave the ensuing morning for Norwich, 
for the purpose of accompanying Mrs. C. to her home. 
The family had all retired to rest, except the faithful 
6* 



130 MR. crane's ministry. 

domestic, who for years had been a member of his 
household, when his disease fell upon him with fatal 
violence. Feeling, after a few struggles, that resist- 
ance was hopeless, he committed his spirit, his wife, 
and his children, to God, and laid him down and died, 
in the forty-fifth year of his life, and having just en- 
tered on the twenty-third of his ministry. He was cut 
down like a tree that yielded much fruit, and that was 
laden with blossoms, even in its fall." 

The following is an abstract of the beautiful sketch 
given of his character, by Dr. Murray, in the sermon 
before alluded to. He was blessed by God with a 
natural disposition remarkable for its amiability and 
sweetness. By his severe trials and afflictions this dis- 
position was never soured or changed. He was one 
of the most desirable friends and companions we have 
ever known. A near and dear relative relates that, for 
twenty years, she never saw a ruffle upon his temper. 
And all his brethren in the ministry can say that they 
never met with him but with pleasure, and never parted 
with him but with regret. His pleasant and cheerful 
smile always difiused pleasure around him. But it was 
religion which chiefly gave lustre to his character. 
His views of the way of acceptance with God, and of 
the great doctrines of grace, were clear and distinct ; 
and he sought consolation more from resting on the 
great principles of the Gospel, than from excited feel- 
ing. He lived in the constant sense of God's favor and 
acceptance, and seemed to have little else to do than to 
serve God with all his might. 

His character as a preacher and pastor, have been 
highly appreciated. It was never his ambition to se- 



MR. crane's ministry. 131 

cure the fame of a profound scholar, or of a great theo- 
logian, or of an acute controvertist ; and whilst he was 
a good scholar, and a sound theologian, and carefully 
discriminated between truth and error, his great object 
was so to preach Christ, as to lead his hearers to believe 
on him. We have never heard him preach a sermon 
of which it could not be truly said, both as to the mat- 
ter and manner, that it was a sweet savor of Christ, 
and as ointment poured forth. — His qualifications as a 
pastor very far surpassed those of many of his brethren. 
It was to him a pleasure, instead of a cross, to mingle 
with his people ; and so frank and winning were his 
ways, that, without repelling any, he attracted all to 
himself His was an uncommonly sympathizing heart. 
Whilst, as a mere preacher, he has left behind him some 
superiors, and many equals ; yet, when we regard him 
as a preacher and pastor, he has left behind him no su- 
perior, and but very few equals. In these respects the 
church has lost one of her best models. 

Mr. Crane departed this life on the 10th day of 
Nov., 1840. His funeral was attended on the 14th, by 
a large concourse of people, who listened to an appro- 
priate discourse, by the Rev. John Goldsmith, from 
Phil. i. 21 : " For to me to live," &c. 

The present pastor was installed May 5th, 1841. 
Rev. Dr. Spring preached the sermon ; his text was 
1 Pet. iii. 15. Rev. Mr. Goldsmith gave the charge to 
the minister, and the Rev. M. W. Jacobus, of Brook- 
lyn, the charge to the people. In the fall of 1844, God 
graciously revived his work, and about forty were add- 
ed to the communion of the church ; the winter of 
1846 was also a time of refreshing, which resulted in 



132 MR. crane's ministry. 

the hopeful conversion of nearly thirty persons. There 
are, at present, not far from one hundred and eighty 
families in the congregation ; and, at the time of our 
last report to the Presbytery, there were four hundred 
and seventeen members of the church. The writer is 
happy to add, that there has been the utmost harmony 
in the congregation during the six years and a half of 
his connexion with it. More than twenty ministers 
have preceded me here, the greater number of them 
pastors ; and but one of them survives. From time to 
time they have fallen, nearly every one of them, I be- 
lieve, at some post of usefulness, faithful to their char- 
acter and office, to the last. Six of them died during 
their pastoral connexion with the church in Jamaica ; 
five of them lie buried with their people in this place ; 
five of them made a sudden exit, three of them having 
preached on the very day of their death. 



APPENDIX. 



Showing the Presbyteries with which this Church has been 
connected. 

This church belonged to the Presbytery of Philadelphia, 
from 1711 to 1716. It was set off to the Presbytery of Long 
Island, which was organized at Southampton, April 17th, 1717, 
and which was the first Presbytery constituted in the province 
of New- York. May 24th5 1738, the Presbytery of Long Island 
was united with the eastern part of Jersey, under the name of 
the Presbytery of New- York, under the jurisdiction of which 
this church continued, until the ministry of Mr. Mills, who be- 
came a member of the Suflblk Presbytery. On the 20th of 
May, 1774, in the Synod of New- York and Philadelphia, "a 
reference was brought in from the Presbytery of New- York, 
praying the advice of the Synod, whether the congregation of 
Jamaica, on Long Island, whose late minister, the Rev. Mr. 
Mills, belonged to the Presbytery of Suffolk, may be taken un- 
der their care as they formerly were, and had never been dis- 
missed. The Synod allowed that the above congregation be 
taken under the care of the Presbytery of New-York." (Min- 
utes of Synod, p. 454.) Accordingly, by the last named Pres- 
bytery, Mr. Burnet was ordained here in 1774. But Mr. Fai- 
toute says, that at the time he came here, a dispute had existed 
some time, whether this church belonged to the Presbytery of 
Suffolk, or the Presbytery of New- York; the Synod, in 1789, 
decided that it belonged to the Presbytery of New-York, which 
body proceeded to install Mr. Faitoute. In 1790, the Presby- 
tery of Suffolk was dissolved, and a new one formed under the 
original name of the Presbytery of Long Island, and this con- 
gregation was attached to it. It was organized at Jamaica, 
November, 1790. Dr. Buell was appointed to preach. In 1809, 
the minister and congregation of Jamaica requested to be de- 
tached from the Presbytery of Long Island, and placed under the 
care of the Presbytery of New- York, which request was grant- 
ed. From that date to the present, there has been no change 
in the Presbyterial relations of this church. 



134 APPENDIX. 

II. 

Catalogue of the Ministers of the Church. 

Zeehariah Walker, David Bostwick,' 

John Prudden, Eliha Spencer, D.D. 

William Woodruflf, Benoni Bradner, 

George Phillips, William Mills,'^ 

Jeremiah Hobart, Matthias Burnet. D.D. 

John Hubbard,^ George Faitoute,^ 

Francis Goodhiue.'^ Henry R. Weed, D.D.' 

George McNish,^ Seymour P. Funck,' 

Robert Cross, Elias W. Crane,^ 

Walter Wilmot,*''^ James M. Macdonald, 

III. 

Elders of the Church. 

Mr. McNish at the meeting of the Presbytery in 1716 gave 
reasons for not bringing an elder with him, which were sus- 
tained. At the first meeting of the Synod of Philadelphia, in 
1717, John Rodes (Rhodes) was present as an elder, who 
was, I have no doubt, from Jamaica. In 1737, Philip Tanner 
was present in Synod as an elder, who, I think, was, also from 
Jamaica. Daniel Smith, anelder of this church, was present in 
1720. He died on the 15th day of October, 1754, having been 
born in 1663 or 64. By his last will and testament he gave 
the Register, which is now in use by this church. Elias Bay- 
lis was present for the first time in Synod in 1734. As we have 
no Records of Session, and no Register extending back of the 
middle of the last century, it is probably impossible to form a 
complete list of the Ruling Elders of this church. With the 
exception of Messrs. Rhodes and Tanner, respecting whom 
there may be some doubt, the following are known to have 
been Ruling Elders in this church: 

John Rhodes, Elias Baylis, 

Philip Tanner, Joseph Skidmore, Esq. 

Daniel Smith,^ Daniel Baylis,* 

■ Ordained when settled here. ' Died pastors of this church. 

^Died October 15th, 1754. 

* Daniel Baylis, is supposed to have come from England. He had five 
sons, who were all elders of Presbyterian Churches. Isaac was an elder of 
the Huntington Church ; Daniel, of the Goshen Church ; Oliver and 



APPENDIX. 



135 



Increase Carpenter, 
Nehemiah Smith, 
Nicholas Smith, 
Samuel Denton, 
Benjamin Thurston, 
Benjamin Everitt, 
Richard Creed, 
William Ludlum, 
Thomas Baylis, 
Abraham Burtis,' 



Benjamin I. Smith,' 
Hon. Eliphalet Wickes,'^ 
Amos Denton,^ 
Nathan Shelton,M. D.^ 
Charles S. Lord,^ 
John Carpenter,' 
Nathaniel Carpenter,' 
Jas. H. Reeve,'' 
Daniel Baylis,* 



Daniel Smith,' 
Elias Baylis, 
Samuel Denton, 
Nicholas Smith, 



IV. 

Deacons. 



Michael Skidmore,^ 
Othniel Everitt,* 
Laurens Reeve,^ 
James Rider/ 



Trustees of the Church. 



Benj. Thurston, 1791 

Benj. Everett. Esq. Pres. 1791 

Jacob Carpenter, Pres. 1791 

Nicholas Everitt. 1791 

David Lambertson, 1791 

Daniel Ludlum, Esq. 1791 

Daniel Smith, 1791 



Wm.Ludlum,Esq. Pres. 1791 
Stephen Herriman, 1791 

Ephraim Baily, 1791 

Daniel Higbie, 1793 

Joseph Robinson. 1793 

Bernardus Hendrickson,1793 
Nehemiah Everitt, 1794 



Elias, of the Huntington Church ; Thomas was an elder of the Jamaica 
Church. Several of his grandchildren are at this time officers of Pres- 
byterian Churches. Thomas Baylis, an elder, and Abraham Baylis, a 
deacon of the Second Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn, and Daniel 
Baylis, one of the elders of the Church in Jamaica, are of this number. 

» Elected Feb, 23d, 1817. Dismissed April 29th, 1821. 

» Elected June 3d, 1819. Ceased acting Nov. 7th, 1826. 

« Elected May 13th, 1821. Dismissed Nov. 7th, 1826. 

* Elected Feb. 21st, 1847. 

^ Died Oct. 15th, 1754. 

« Ordained Jan. 13th, 1819. Ceased acting 1833. 

' Ordained Sept. 22nd, 1833. 



1 



136 



APPENDIX. 



Eliphalet Wickes, Esq. 
Samuel Mills. 
Benj. Everitt, 
James Denton, 
Simeon Smith, 
Henry Mills, 
Othniel Smith, 
Dan'l Ludlum, Jr. Pres. 
Benj. N. Smith, 
John Rhodes, 
Richard Creed, 
Thomas Baylis, 
David Lamberson. Jr. 
Daniel Smith, 
Michael Skidmore, 



1795 John Rider, Pres. 1824 

1796 Gen. VanWyck Wickes. 1827 
1798 David Bergen, ' 1827 
1802 John Rhodes, Jr., 1827 
1802 Daniel Baylis, 1827 
1805 Laurens Reeve, Jr. Pres. 1829 
1805 Samuel Higbie, 1829 
1805 Nich's S. Everitt, 1830 
1805 Thomas Smith, 1831 
1810 James Baylis, 1831 
1813 James Herriman, 1833 
1817 Benj. Bergen, 1833 
1817 Daniel Baylis. 1837 

1817 Amos Denton, 1842 

1818 Wm. Ludlam, 1843 
James Rider, 1845 

VI. 

Number of Communicants annually reported as far back as 
can be ascertained. 

[Up to the year 1826, the year ends on the first of October ; 
from 1827 to 1847, on the first of April.] 



Year. 


Total 


Year. 


Total 


Year. 


Total 


Year. 


Total 




in com. 




in com. 




in com. 




in com. 


1807 


46 


1818 


160 


1829 


270 


1840 


392 


1808 


47 


1819 


169 


1830 


276 


1841 


380 


1809 


49 


1820 


177 


1831 


278 


1842 


373 


1810 


51 


1821 


184 


1832 


333 


1843 


369 


1811 


53 


1822 


193 


1833 


338 


1844 


368 


1812 


58 


1823 


196 


1834 


335 


1845 


404 


1813 


55 


1824 


201 


1835 


328 


1846 


403 


1814 


54 


1825 




1836 


325 


1847 


417 


1815 


53 


1826 


197 


1837 


316 






1816 


118 


1827 


263 


1838 


328 






1817 


147 


1828 


262 


1839 


327 










In 1793, there were fifty-eight communicants. In 
1762, there were but twelve, whose names are thus 
given by the Rev. Mr. Mills : 

Benjamin Hinchman; Nehemiah Denton ; Deborah Denton, 
his wife John Carman, and his wife ; Samuel Denton ; Dea. 
Elias Baylis, and his wife ; Mr. (John) Messenger ; Obadiah 
Smith, and his wife; Elizabeth Smith, (Justice Smith's wife.) 



INDEX. 





Page 




Page 


Apple-tree, Mr. Hubbard, preaches 


Congregation distracted 


114 


under one .... 


. 43 


Contention .... 


116 


Apple-tree, Mr. Whitetield, preache 




Conviction of sinners 


. 120 


under one .... 


97 


Court decree for Mr. Bloomer . 


. 101 


Bartow's, Rev. Mr., account of t 




Crane, E. W 


128 


scene of confusion 


42 


" " recommended by Mr 




Baylis, Daniel .... 


134 


Nettleton. 


128 


" " spirited reply of 


. 106 


" " his death 


. 129 


" Elias, narrative of his sufTer 


. 


Cross, Rev. R 


71 


ings 


105 


Delancey, General Oliver, quarters a 




Baptism vindicated . 


91 


the parsonage. 


. 104 


" of children . 


113 


Denton, Daniel, first town-clerk 


. 13 


Beekman, Gerardus . 


54 


" " first historian of Ne\ 




Bishop of London's letter 


68 


York 


' 13 


Bloomer's, Rev. Mr., letter 


100 


Denton, Rev. Richard 


225 


Boy put into the window of th< 




Disciple, old .... 


116 


church .... 


43 


Elders 


134 


Brainerd's, David, mother 


31 


Elizabethtown, N. J., settled . 


13 


Bostwick, David 


85 


" Ohio, named 


99 


" " invited to N. Y. 


86 


Episcopal Church, first 


33 


Bradner Benoni 


95 


Everitt, Mrs. E. ... 


97 


Burnett's, Gov., letter 


73 


Faitoute's, Rev. G., Sketch 


5 


Burnet, Matthias 


102 


" " extract from 


110 


" " preached during the 




" " installed . 


111 


revolution . 


103 


" " principal of U. 




" " Mr. Faitoute's ac 




H. Academy 


112 


count of 


107 


" " his death . 


111 


" " his farewell service 


107 


Farms of Mr. Mills . 


99 


" " visits Jamaica 


108 


Fletcher's, Governor, zeal 


7 


" " settles at Nor walk 


108 


Funck, Rev. S. P. . 


114 


" " his death 


109 


Glassbrook. Rev. J. . 


109 


Candidates .... 


109 


Goodhue, Rev. F. . . . 


46 


Campbell's, Mr., account of a law 




" " elegant lines on 


47 


suit 


74 


Gordon, Rev. P., buried in a "meet- 




Carpenter, Abigail 


105 


ing-house " . 


45 


Charter of privileges . 


9 


Governors, colonial, persecute . 


34 


" of church in Jamaica 


110 


Grahame, James, Esq. 


8 


Church organized 


22 


Hampton, Rev. J., imprisoned . 


48 


" its constitution 


23 


Heathcote, Col., member of Soc. 


59 


" stone erected 


28 


" "his letter . 


64 


" C. Congreve's report on 


34 


" Rev. Mr. . 


79 


" Doors forced . 


40 


Hicks, Whitehead, Esq. . 


104 


" wardens, Presbyterians . 


100 


Highlanders in church 


104 


" built .... 


112 


Hobart, Rev. J., declines call 


29 


Clergy, Presbyterian and revolution- 




" " accepts 


30 


ary war .... 


103 


" " grandfather of Davi( 




Congreve's C, report 


34 


Brainerd 


31 


Cornbury becomes governor, 


10 


" " testimony in favoi 




" persecutes Presbyterians 


10 


of Bible 


31 


•' his character 


10 


Honeyman, Rev. Mr. 


45 


" resides at Jamaica 


37 


Horton, Rev. S., called 


92 


Clowes, Samuel 


50 


Hubbard, Rev. J. . . . 


32 


Crane's history 


5 


" " trials . . 41, 


42,43 


Coe, Justice .... 


60 


" " death . 


44 



138 



Page 
Hunter, Col., offers his purse to Mr. 

Foyer ... 56 

" " writes the sec'y . . 59 

Inhabitants of Jamaica, oritrin of . 13 

Jamaica, whence the name . . 13 

Justices remit lines .... 54 

Law-snit 100 

" in another case ... 66 

Makemie, Rev. Mr., imprisoned . 48 

Mather's, Cotton, letter ... 36 

Meeting-house first built ... 18 

Mercur>% N. Y., extract from . . 39 

Minis! n,' act enforced ... 33 

McNish's, Rev. G., ministry . . 47 
" " licensed bv Gov. 

of Maryland . 48 

" " called to Jamaica 49 

" " father of Presby- 

terianism in N. Y. . . . 70 

McDowell, Dr. Wm. ... 127 

MUls, Rev. VV 95 

" " called to Philadelphia 98 

" " his death ... 98 

Murray's, Dr., account of Mr. Crane . 1'28 

Mompesson's, Judge, opinion . . 51 

Morris, Col., a member of the Soc. . 50 

" his letter ... 61 

" " opinion of Combury . 61 

Narrative, interesting . . .115 

Nettleton, Rev. A 114 

" recommends Mr. 

Crane 138 

New- York evacuated, Whigs return 108 

Onderdonk's revolutionary incidents 103 

Parsonage first built .... 16 

" valuable .... 34 

" taken from Mr. Hubbard . 40 
" old sold . . . .113 

" new bought . . . 113 

PhdUps, Rev. G 29 

" character . . 30 

Poyer, Col., at Pembroke Castle . 50 

Rev. Mr., his shipwreck . . 56 
" '■ his opinion of Mr. 

McNish . . 69 

" " suit ... 66 

" " letters ... 51 

Prime, Rev, E 98 

Pmdden, Rev. J., called ... 21 

his birth. &c. . . 21 

" " returns to Jamaica 27 

" " called to Newark . 27 

" " epitaph and character 28 

Psalm at Mr. Bnrnet's farewell . . 107 

Queen of England appealed to . . 67 

Records of Jamaica .... 12 

" ■' extracts from . 14 

" " contain early 

church history .... 15 



Pa^e 

Revival of religion . . . 79, 82 

" " in Springfield, N.J. 128 

" " another ... 97 

" " another . . . 113 

Rodgers, Dr., preaches ... 98 

Riv. Gazette, extract from . . 98 

Salary paid to Mr. McNish . . .52 

Seaburv, Rev Mr., extract of letter . 97 

Sermons. Mr. Mills's ... 99 

Sheriff, Presbyterian ... 50 

Sickness great, in N. Y. . . . 37 

Smith's, Hon. Wm., account . . 37 

" " portrait of Mr. 

Bostwick 91 

Spencer, E., D.D 93 

" " character and epitaph 94 

Stnyvestant, Gov 7 

Synod dismiss Mr. Cross . . 77 

" commission of ... 87 

" refuse to remove 3Ir. Mills . 98 
Steeple in danger . 103 

Soldiere' canton at Jamaica . . 104 
Taxes, people refuse to pay . . 99 
Thomas, Rev. Mr., his opinion of the 

people at Hempstead and Jamaica 35 
Townsend, Jotham .... 179 

Trustees 135 

Tyler's Dr., Memoir of Mr. Nettleton 115 
Urquhart's, Rev. Mr., death, . . 45 
" " his widow surren- 

ders the parsonage 49 
" " step-daughter mar- 

ries a Presbyterian 
Vestrymen first chosen 
Vesey, Rev. Mr., supplies 
" ■■ makes a tool of Mr. 

Pover 
Walker, Rev. Z. 

" " his salary 

" " opinions about him 

" " reasons for leaving 

Jamaica 
" " anecdote of him 

War and Mr. Burnet 
Whitetield, George, first visit 

second visit 
Whigs sent off to prison 
Wilmot, Rev. W. . . . 
" " Mrs., her character 

" " his piety 

" " his death 

" " his epitaph 

Woman. Scotch, thoughtful 
Weed, H.R.. D.D . . 
" ■' dismissed 

" " his useful labors 

Woodruff", Rev. W. . . 
^Vol^ey a student 
York's, Duke of, charter . 



55 
33 
45 

63 
17 

17 
18 

19 
20 
103 
81 
97 
106 
79 
80 
81 
84 
84 
104 
113 
114 
113 
26 
49 
9 



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Rev. JOSEPH BELLAMY'S WORKS. With Preface, by Rev. Jonathan 

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PAYNE'S ELEMENTS OF MENTAL AND MORAL SCIENCE. 

ID" Orders for Books, from a distance, executed at the very lowest prices. 



Leavitt, Trow ^ Co.^s Publications. 



EDWA RDS' WORKS, 

Bound in a superior manner. The Fifth Edition. 

The complete Works of President Jonathan Edwards. A 
reprint of the Worcester edition, without alteration or mutilation, 
with valuable additions, and a copious General Index, never before 
added. 

The following is the Advertisement prefixed to the work : 

" The present edition of the works of President Edwards is a reprint of that 
published at Worcester, with some variation of the arrangement, and consider- 
able additions from other sources. The pieces added are as follows : — 1. Dis- 
tinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit. 2. God's Moral Government, a 
Future State, and the Immortality of the Soul. 3. The necessity and reason- 
ableness of the Christian doctrine of Satisfaction for Sin. 4. The Perseverance 
of the Saints. 5. The Endless Punishment of those who die Impenitent. 6. 
Fourteen Sermons. 

" While the accuracy of the Worcester Edition has been carefully preserved, 
the value of the present publication has been greatly enhanced, not only by 
the introduction of the above mentioned matter, but hj the Copious General 
Index inserted at the close of the 4th volume. This has been prepared with 
much labour, and will be found to be unusually complete. For obvious reasons, 
the references are generally made in the very language of Edwards. Thus 
has all suspicion of partiality and misrepresentation been precluded, and the 
reader is presented besides, on many points, with a brief synopsis of the author's 
views and trains of argument. The publishers flatter themselves that they 
have done a service to the cause both of theological learning and practical piety, 
by making an improved edition of these invaluable works more accessible to 
the religious public than any former one has been." 

The publishers have been highly favoured with Recommenda- 
tions and Notices of their edition of this standard work. The fol- 
lowing are part: 

" This certifies, that I, the subscriber, have been conversant with those who 
have been concerned in publishing the new edition of the works of Jonathan 
Edwards, at New- York, and that I have been particularly acquainted with 
their proceedings; indeed, I should have consented, in compliance with Mr. 
Leavitt's request, to superintend the publication, had my other duties permitted. 
The edition is in four large octavo volumes, on good paper, and bound in very 
handsome sheep. It contains the whole of the Worcester edition, copied faith- 
fully, with several valuable additions. 

" The value of this edition is greatly increased by a Table of Contents in 
each volume, and a copious General Index. 

" The writings of President Edwards need no recommendation from me ; 
but I have thought it proper to give this testimony to the high value of this 
edition, and to assure ministers of the Gospel, theological students, and all 
others, that they may have full confidence in the care and fidelity of those who 
have conducted the business of this important publication, and in the correct- 
ness with which they have accomplished their undertaking 

" Leonard Woods. 

" Theological Seminary, Andover, Dec. 15, 1842." 
From Prof. Ed. Eohinson, D. D. 

" It is right to congratulate the religious public that they now have access 
to the works of this greatest of American divines, in a form so cheap, so con- 
venient, and so permanent. This edition cannot but take its place for genera- 
tions to come as the standard copy. Clergymen and laymen may now have 



Leaviit, Troiv S^ Co.^s Puhlicatio7is. 



the whole works of Edwards as readily as they have other books. Would 
they but also read them, and spread them far and wide, and so best counteract 
the tendencies of the cheap and trashy reading of the present day ! Edwards 
was a missionary : and what should hinder liberal men, or a liberal man, from 
placing a copy of his works in the hands of every missionary who has gone 
forth from this land, either to foreign climes or to our own far west? How 
would thus his mighty influence be spread abroad, and act with still more di- 
rectness upon the conversion of the world 1" 

A distant Clergyman writes to us : 
" Gentlemen — I was truly rejoiced to see in the New- York Observer a no- 
tice that you had republished without mutilation the entire works of the elder 
Edwards. I know not when I have been so much gratified in seeing the notice 
of any publication. I am an enthusiastic admirer of Edwards the elder, on 
account of both his talents and piety. I deem that a greater service could not 
have been done for the Church than has been done by the republication of the 
entire works of President Edwards. I wish a copy of them, and will use my 
influence with the brethren of the presbytery to obtain a circulation of them in 
this section of the country." 

Dr. Chalmers' opinion of President Edwards. 

" Looking lo Edwards, we behold the most philosophical of all theologians, 
at the same time the humblest and holiest of men. The most powerful in con- 
troversy with the learned, and yet the most plain and powerful of address to 
the consciences of a plain, unlettered congregation — the most successful in find- 
ing his way through the mazes of metaphysic subtlety, and yet the honoured 
instrument of many awakenings, the most successful in the work of winning 
souls." 

" The greatest man of the world." — Robert Hall. 

" His power of subtile argument, perhaps unmatched, certainly unsurpassed 
among men." — Sir James Mackintosh. 

Notwithstanding the large amount of matter embraced in these 
four volumes, and the great expense attendant upon getting them 
up, we have put the work at a very low price. 

BARNES' NOTES ON JOB. 

Fourth Edition. 2 vols. 12mo. 
This is said to be the best work on the Scriptures ever written 
by Mr. Barnes. 

From the New- York Observer. 
" The more we read them, the more we value them, for the clearness of 
their illustration, the wonderful research and industry with which they are 
elaborated, and the interest with which they are invested by the antiquity, sub- 
limity, and peculiarity of the book which they explore." 

From the JV. Y. Evangelist. 
" We shall be much mistaken if it does not rank, in the judgment of schol- 
ars, both in this country and in Europe, not only as the most successful of the 
labours of Mr. Barnes in this line, but as one of the happiest efforts of Biblical 
criticism, of acute and learned exposition, that has lately appeared. It is a 
most able, useful, and creditable work." 

Jiisi Published, a new and revised edition of 

BARNES' NOTES ON ISAIAH. 

2 vols. 12nio. 



SCHOOL GREEK TESTAMENT. 

Retail price, one dollar, handsomely bound. 

Edited by Dr. Edward Robinson, from the text of Hahn. One 12mo volume 

— bound in same style as the " Odyssey." 

From Professor Stuart, of Andover Theological Seminary. 

" Every thing about this edition of Hahn wears the air of great neatness. 
The type is excellent ; the paper good, the printing unusually correct; and the 
pointing judicious. It is a beautiful volume, and well worthy of the most 
extensive public patronage and approbation. Those who are acquainted with 
the literary labors of Prof Robinson, will need no assurance that accuracy in 
the reprint has been well secured. No edition can be immaculate. Yet we 
have not found a single error of any kind in the American edition, so far as wo 
have read. There can scarcely be a doubt, that this edition of the New Testa- 
ment will, from its cheapness and excellence, soon occupy the whole of our 
market. It is truly a work of multum in parvo." 

Also an edition of the above, octavo size, printed on fine sized paper, suitabl«» 
for writing marginal notes. 



NOTICE TO TEACHERS. 

THE NEW SPELLING BOOK. 

Just published, 

THE NEW ENGLISH SPELLiNG BOOK. 

Designed to teach Orthography and Orthoepy — with a Critical Analysis of the 
Language, and a Classification of its Klements, on a new plan; with appro- 
priate lessons for the instruction and improvement of the young. By the 
" American Society for the Difl'usion of Useful Knowledge." 

From the New- York Observer. 
" We have taken time to examine the book carefully, and the result is, a 
feeling of great obligation to the Society. The English scholar will see, at a 
glance, that such an analysis and classification of his language, is a treasure to 
him, and that he must by all means read the spelling book. The idea unveiled 
in this book, fairly illuminates the language. — We have called this a 'little 
book,' but'we believe the country will receive it as a great book." 

From the New- York Evangelist. 
"This work appears under such auspices, as must call attention to its merits 
and pretensions." 

From the New- York Sun. 
"This little book we consider decidedly the best elementary book of oui 
hnguai^e, that has ever appeared. It is piiilosophically simple, and deserves 
an unbounded patronage." 

From the Christian Observer. 

" From a careful examination of the plan and contents of this book, we 
think it decidedly superior to every other work of the kind with which we arc 
ac'iuiiinted." 

This is the first of a new series of English school books, now in couTfic of 
publication, and we invite all those interested in the cause of education to 
examine this book. 

3 



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TWO ELEGANT VOLUMES, 

AND BOOKS WORTHY A PLACE IN EVERY LIBRARY. 

Just published, a new edition of 

DMSRAELI'S CURIOSITIES OF LITERA- 
TURE. 

Complete in one vol. 8vo. 

Containing the Curiosities of Literature, 1st and 2d series, and the Literary 
Character Illustrated. By I. C. D'Israeli, Esq. With 

CURIOSITIES OF AMERICAN LITERA- 
TURE. 

BY RUFUS W. GRISWOLD. 



Also a new and elegant edition, in one volume, small quarto, 120 fine engrav 

ings, of 

FROISSART'S CHRONICLES OF THE 
MIDDLE AGES. 

Chronicles of England, Fran-^e, Spain, and the adjoining countries, from the 
latter part of the reign of Edward II. to the coronation of Henry IV. By 
Sir John Froissart. 

This will be found to be an e.\ceeclingly interesting work in its descriptions 
and illustrations of the manners and times of the " Middle Ages." 



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